• Supreme Court of India has stayed annual Rath Yatra at Puri's Jagannath Temple in Odisha.
• The Jagannath Puri Rath Yatra, which is considered one of India's biggest chariot festivals was set to commence from June 23.

About the festival

• Ratha Jatra, the Festival of Chariots of Lord Jagannatha is celebrated every year at Puri, the temple town in Odisha, on the east coast of India.
• The presiding deities of the main temple, Sri Mandira, Lord Jagannatha, Lord Balabhadra and Goddess Subhadra, with the celestial wheel Sudarshana are taken out from the temple precincts in an elaborate ritual procession to their respective chariots.
• The huge, colourfully decorated chariots, are drawn by hundreds and thousands of devotees on the bada danda, the grand avenue to the Gundicha temple, some two miles away to the North.
• After a stay for seven days, the deities return to their abode in Srimandira.