India, Jan. 2 -- As devotees thronged the Shrimant Dagdusheth Halwai Ganpati Temple for darshan on the first day of the new year, there were massive traffic jams on Chhatrapati Shivaji Road, Bajirao Road, Laxmi Road, Kelkar Road and the surrounding roads. So much so that the road between Appa Balwant Chowk and Budhwar Chowk (Hutatma Chowk) had to be closed to the traffic by the Pune traffic police.

As many devotees parked their cars on the riverbed road, there were queues of vehicles seen on this road. Whereas internal lanes too were jam-packed with two-wheelers. There were crowds at the temple throughout the day and the traffic police deployed additional security to keep the traffic moving.

Kiran Pisal, a devotee, said, "At around 9 am...