Ranchi: Chief minister Raghubar Das inaugurated the month-long Shravani Mela in Deoghar on Saturday and joined over 50,000 worshippers at Baidyanath Dham on the first day of the holy month.

Doing the honours at Dumma in Deoghar, from where the queue to the temple starts, Das promised to interact with kanwariyas and other devotees in Deoghar via videoconferencing every Monday during Shravan to find quick solutions to their problems. He asked devotees to contact him on Twitter and Facebook.

Apart from CCTV and drone surveillance, this time Deoghar has installed headcount machines at entry and exit gates of main shrine, which would take pictures of persons entering and leaving the shrine. For the ease of devotees, three tent cities with space to accommodate 2,000 people in each have been set up, a 4km stretch of the approach road has cool paint and mist-showers have been installed at various places.

"Deoghar is emerging as one of the world's richest cultural hubs. We want to attract tourists from abroad," Das said.

He also laid the foundation stone for a housing project for families displaced by Deoghar airport expansion project and promised the state government would spend Rs 10 crore on civic amenities. On compensation for land donors, he said Rs 392 crore had already been given and another Rs 42 crore would be released soon. As a symbolic gesture, seven families displaced by the airport project were given land lease deeds. Miss India contestant Anushka Anand from Deoghar was given Rs 1 lakh.

Accompanying Das were his cabinet colleagues Louise Marandi, Randhir Singh, Raj Paliwar and Amar Bauri; MLAs Radha Krishna Kishore, Narayan Das, Janaki Yadav, Badal Patralekh and Jeetu Charan Ram; as well as tourism secretary Manish Ranjan and senior officers.

The chief minister also offered prayers at Baskukinath Dham in Dumka.