Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh: On Monday morning, a woman devotee suffered major burns when her saree caught fire during performing puja in Ujjain’s Shri Mahalkaleshwar temple. The woman’s hands and feet were scorched due to the fire in her saree. She started running here and there to put off the fire in her saree but she got severely burnt in the meantime. The priest of the temple tried to extinguish the fire by wrapping her with a blanket. Later, she was taken to the district hospital where she is put under observation.
On Monday morning, Shobhakunwar and her husband Hanuman Singh, aged 45 years, had come to visit the Shri Mahakaleshwar temple from Jaipur in Rajasthan with 6 other people. Shobhakunwar was having a darshan outside the Trivishteshwar temple located behind the Omkareshwar temple. While bowing down to the deity as part of the puja ritual, the woman’s saree caught fire from the lamp or ‘diya’ burning near the Shivling on the temple premises.
While the woman started running here and there in the temple premises to douse the fire, many other devotees tried to help her. But as she was running consistently, the fire started increasing rapidly in the saree because of the air. Upon seeing the saree caught in fire, the priest of the temple, Dilip Guru tried to extinguish the fire by using a blanket that was brought from the nearby Bhadrakali temple. The woman was immediately taken to the district hospital with the help of an ambulance. Doctors said that the woman’s hands and feet have been burnt severely and she will need to remain admitted for a few days to recover properly.