Govt to host Nabakalebara as a World Event in Digital Space

Bhubaneswar, May 13: In another significant step towards branding of Odisha culture & tourism, Govt has started preparations for hoisting Nabakalebara as a World Event on digital space through interactive website, mobile app and social media. The IT applications for the purpose initiated by IT department was reviewed today in a high level meeting held under Chairmanship of Chief Secretary Sri Gokul Chandra Pati in secretariat conference hall wherein Principal Secretary IT Sri Pradeep Kumar Jena along with IT team presented the updates for discussion. Reviewing the progress, Chief Secretary advised to ensure the factual consistency and accuracy of the information put on the website. The department has also been advised to include outskirts of Puri like Raghurajpur, Sakshigopal, Pipili, Konark on the website. A committee has been constituted with Chief Administrator, Puri Temple Sri Suresh Chandra Mohapatra, Principal Secretary IT Sri P.K. Jena, Secretary information & Public Relation Sri Madhusudan Padhi, Secretary Tourism & Culture Dr Arabanida Padhee   Collector, Puri and Superintendent of Police, Puri as members to scrutinize the contents to be put in website. Chief Secretary Sri Pati directed to make the website more utility oriented for visitors, tourists and people of Odisha. The website has been named as www.nabakalebara.gov.in.

The presentations show that the website has been designed for making Nabakalebara a world event on digital space, facilitating access of tourists to various civil amenities and to showcase Odisha Travel & Tourism. The target audience of the website are pilgrims, tourists, travel blog writers, travel enthusiasts, people of Odisha and Odias living outside Odisha. Providing information for smooth conduct of an internationally acclaimed festival, streamlining the process both for administration and tourists, creating a direct information channel and improving tourist engagement are other important objectives of this IT initiative, said Principal Secretary IT Sri Jena. The structure of the website contain principal sections like (1) Nabakalebara- its history, role of daitapatis, sevayats & ongoing rituals; (2) Visit Plan- map, how to reach, tour guide, accommodation, Puri outskirts, places to visit in Odisha; (3) In News- twitter speaks, open mind, multimedia, archive; (4) Utilities- health, parking, safety, local travel etc; and, (5) Shree Khshetra- its history, ongoing rituals. The schedule of the festival, video, photographs, books art and music relating to Shreekshetra and Nabakalebara will also be out in the website. Chief Administrator Jagannath Temple Sri Mohapatra said that temple administration will provide day wise photographs and videos of the happenings and rituals in the temple to be hoisted in website. The website will also be related to social media like twitter, facebook, googley+, youtube and mobile app. It has been decided to relate this new website with www.nabakalebara.nic.in hoisted earlier by Tourism department so that anybody switching to the earlier site will also be automatically linked to the new site.

The Additional Chief Secretary Finance Sri R. Balakrishnan, Director General of Police Sri Sanjeeb Marik, Principal Secretary Home Sri Asit Kumar Tripathy, Secretary Tourism & Culture Dr Arabinda Padhee, Dy Director Information & Public Relations Sri Niranjan Sethi along with senior officers from departments of IT, OCAC and NIC participated in deliberations.