 "Ayodhya")
The Ujjain city in Madhya Pradesh on Saturday evening set a new Guinness world record by lighting 18.82 lakh diyas or earthen oil lamps.
About 20,000 volunteers took part in the event which was staged mainly across the banks of the Kshipra river.
Swapnil Dangarikar, Guinness World Records' adjudicator, said the previous world record for the "largest display of oil lamps was set at Ayodhya during Diwali 2022 when 15.76 lakh lamps were lit. The record has now been broken in Ujjain with 18.82 lakh oil lamps being lit on Saturday evening, he announced.
The diyas were to be lit for minimum five minutes which was done successfully here, he said. The event had been organized by the local administration with the help of citizens' groups. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who attended the program with his wife, later informed that a total of 18,82,229 lamps were lit on the occasion.
A laser show was also staged.
The local authorities had set themselves the target of lighting 21 lakh oil lamps to mark the festival of Maha Shivaratri on Saturday. They managed to light 18.82 lakh lamps. On Maha Shivaratri last year, 11,71,078 earthen lamps were lit in Ujjain. The entire event on Saturday was based on the zero waste principle, city officials said.
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