Cuttack, May 16: The stretch from OMP Square to Press Chhak via Link Road in the city today almost became the Grand Road of Puri, evoking a feeling of "mini rath yatra" as lakhs of devotees turned up there to pull the sagadi (cart) carrying the daru of Lord Jagannath.

Braving rain and thunderstorm, the devotees pulled the sagadi up to Pratapnagari on the National Highway No. 5 that connects the twin cities of Cuttack and Bhubaneswar. Though earlier in the day, excess heat had created problem for them, heavy rain, accompanied with gusty winds, around 6.45pm provided the much-needed relief.

Every year during rath yatra, lakhs of devotees and tourists pull the Trinity's chariots on Grand Road in Puri.

"I felt as if we were walking on the Grand Road in Puri and on our way to have a darshan of the Lord inside the temple. We are lucky enough to have a darshan of the sacred log," said Shankarshan Das, a devotee from Salepur.

Despite the rain, devotees kept on pulling the cart with enthusiasm as the entire stretch reverberated with chants of "Jai Jagannath". The daru (the sacred neem wood) would be used for making the Lord's nabakalebar (new idol).

Thousands of devotees not only from Cuttack, but also from Choudwar and Salepur had turned up to have a darshan of the sacred log.

Many feel that it was the love for the Lord that the devotees took a lot of pain and were seen standing in serpentine queues for several hours despite the intense heat conditions. Official sources said over three to four lakh devotees had turned up to have a glimpse of the holy log.

"There was not a single grain's space left during the evening hours after the sagadi carrying the sacred wood was pulled on the streets by the devotees," said Omprakash Sahu, another devotee.

The residents of Cuttack, in another development, played hosts to the devotees, who were provided with maha prasad by the Shirdi Sai Temple at Bidyadharpur earlier in the day. Water pouches, lassi and other cool drinks were served on the entire stretch for those coming to have the Lord's darshan.

Special bhajan programmes were also organised to welcome the devotees from various parts of the city. Besides, a lot of people had painted the roads with various thematic rangoli to welcome Jagannath. Police roped in over 400 volunteers to streamline the arrangements and traffic on the Cuttack-Paradip road as well as the Cuttack-Bhubaneswar NH.

Drawing lessons from the past experience and chaotic scenes during pulling of the cart carrying the log of Lord Balabhadra and Goddess Subhadra, the cops had taken elaborate steps for traffic diversion at several places. Keeping the people's rush in mind, vehicular traffic coming from Sikharpur was diverted towards Matamath into the city today. Besides, vehicles heading for Bhubaneswar were also diverted towards Ring Road.

The movement of heavy vehicles, especially on the highway, was also curtailed. "This time, our focus was on traffic as well as crowd management. We had deployed over 27 platoons of police for the security," said deputy commissioner of police Sanjeev Arora.

After a night's halt at Pratapnagari, the sagadi of the Lord would leave for Puri via Bhubaneswar tomorrow evening.