Dress with nine gems stitched for Ram Lalla

Ayodhya, August 3

For the past three-and-a-half decades, brothers Shankarlal and Bhagwatlal ‘Pahaadhi’ have been stitching clothes for Ram Lalla in Ayodhya. Their dedication will be manifest in the splendid dress they have meticulously crafted for the deity to wear on August 5, during the bhoomi pujan ceremony of the Ram temple. The special dress for the ceremony has nine gems stitched in golden thread.

Operating from their shop named after their late father Babulal and located in the city’s Badhi Kutiyaa area, the brothers stitch clothes for only deities and seers.

“My father late Babulal started stitching the clothes of Ram Lalla in 1985. He used to carry our sewing machine to the Ramjanmabhoomi and stitch the clothes with me and my elder brother in tow,” Shankarlal (54) said on Monday.

Shankarlal said for the bhoomi pujan two sets of dresses have been made — one is green, while the other is orange. “The clothes are made using soft material such as ‘makhmal’ (velvet). The green dress has been made keeping in mind the day-specific colour, while orange is considered auspicious,” he said.

On Sunday, the dresses were handed over by the tailors, said Acharya Satyendra Das, the chief priest of the Ram temple. — PTI