Cuttack: Orissa High Court on Thursday directed both the state government and the Shree Jagannath Temple Administration to ensure that the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) can undertake repair work of Jay Bijay Dwar for 12 hours in a day when the deities are outside the shrine for rath yatra.

The repair has been taken up since May 12 in two shifts - first in the morning from mangal alati to dwarapal and puja and then in the afternoon from completion of second bhog after madhyadhupa till sandhya alati.

"The division bench of Chief Justice Vineet Saran and Justice B.R. Sarangi issued the direction after it had been pointed out that the ASI could undertake repair work for hardly two hours a day," central government counsel Chandrakanta Pradhan said.

"It was also pointed out that the ASI had planned to resume repair by fixing stainless steel beams from July 15 (the day after rath yatra) and complete it before end of the car festival on July 25," Pradhan said.

ASI (Bhubaneswar circle) superintending archaeologist H.A. Naik submitted a status report on Thursday.