The Puja festival in Kolkata has just concluded. All the excitements and anticipations are over.
One sometimes feels that the anticipation, the build-up, the sense of something great and exciting about to happen, just before the puja festival, is more exciting than when the puja starts. Once the puja starts, it is over in a blink. The days pass in a blur, and suddenly we witness the Bisorjon in Dasomi. Forlorn sad feelings set in, in the hearts of every resident of Bengal and the Bengalis living far away from home. The long wait for the puja next year begins.
This year’s puja, though, was a tad different. Last year, due to the outbreak of Covid19 induced pandemic, the puja was a subdued affair. There was a lot of fear in the revelers’ minds, and they exercised caution to some extent.
But to compensate for last year’s subdued affair, this year, everything, all the cautions, was blown to smithereens. Most did not follow any protocol. The revelers, to compensate for the loss of last year’s fun and frolic, went overboard. The crowd, the pomp, the decorations of the pandals, the lightings are all back to the pre-covid days.
In confirmation with the recent trends, this year also, the madness started from just after the Mahalaya. People were out in the streets all night, to go pandal-hopping, from Dwitiya itself, mostly without maintaining any Covid protocol.
Even the administration changed the directives and lifted the night ban. We are to see how things unfold now on the pandemic front.
The uniqueness of the Kolkata Durga Puja Festival
Kolkata Durga puja is unique for many reasons. The most redeeming feature of the Kolkata Durga puja is the concept of themes. The themes are a far cry from the traditional puja. While most idols are of clay in ordinary pujas, for the theme pujas, it could be made of anything under the sun. While the pandals are mostly functional in normal pujas, for the theme pujas, they are mostly highly innovative, both a triumph of innovation and ingenuity.
For the uninitiated, the theme is a concept that depicts a specific idea. The theme creators develop the concept painstakingly and bring that idea to fruition with a lot of ingenuity. The themes mostly depict a story or an event. Or a theme might be the re-creation of a past architectural edifice. The theme could be a recent event or an event from the past. This could also be a replica of an ancient temple or a huge palace that is created as a theme for the pandal. There is no standard rule. The only rule is to get the result as exotic and eye-catching as possible.
The whole effect is highly artistic. It is the ingenuity of the concept creators and those who execute the project that stands out. The whole process of creating the themes is highly creative and brings out the true artistic spirit of the creators.
The material with which the artists create these idols and pandals can be anything under the earth. They can be as diverse as broken household items or bits of broken glass, plastic waste, anything that the theme demands.
It is a unique creative endeavor for something whose life is only a few days at best. The whole process starts much before the festival time. Creating the concept, sourcing the material appropriate to the concept is itself a full-fledged endeavor.
Then comes the execution of the project. The pandal and the idol, along with the surrounding area, must be made ready as per the pre-decided theme. The artisans must complete the project within a fixed time. Most of the artisans involved in the project are un-educated in the traditional sense. Yet, they show enormous understanding of their art form to execute the project flawlessly.
By all means, the whole process is, in no way, less than any industrial project execution, with strict time and budget constraints. The whole process is executed flawlessly without any lengthy management meetings with high-sounding agendas!
Various political leaders of different parties patronize the puja organizers, who are local clubs. The political patronization helps the organizers to bring in funds to finance the projects. The budget for the projects most often goes beyond several crores of rupees. Political muscle flexing and competition are, naturally, common.
Contemporary events as the theme
As I said earlier, most often, the theme depicts a specific thought or concept. It may be a replica of an ancient monument, a temple, a palace. It may also be some contemporary issue that triggers the imagination of the creators and organizers.
Creating the grandeur of an ancient monument may be highly creative and enterprising. But more challenging is to develop a theme that is contemporary enough and also exciting enough to trigger the imagination of the public.
Puja organizers always have a high social consciousness. The themes they develop always depict some burning social or political issues. This year, quite naturally, it is the pandemic induced by Covid19. The horrifying events that unfolded in our lives affected all of us personally. The Covid19 pandemic has, substantially, changed our understanding of the world around us.
Very recently, we have witnessed harrowing events due to the sudden closedown of the economy. We have seen hordes of migrant industrial laborers returning to their native places on foot thousands of kilometers away. We have witnessed the absolute apathy and callousness of the administration towards the plight of these marginalized people.
We have seen spontaneous, peaceful, and apolitical protests regarding NRC and CAA issues. How the women, housewives, old and young spontaneously, without any political banner, came out in the streets to protest against the enactment of laws that are so highly discriminatory.
We have seen the farmers’ protest against the Farm Laws that the parliament is trying to enact. Again, it was a spontaneous and apolitical protest against a draconian state legislature.
We are witnessing how the State brutally intimidates those who dare to speak out the truth.
All these have made an impact on our lives. And for an artist, all these acts as fodder to her imagination to create a puja theme.
Daughter returning home
Bengalis are emotionally connected with Durga Puja. Bengalis consider Durga as the quintessential married daughter, returning home to her parent's house, with her children, for a short holiday. The emotional connection the Bengalis have with Durga Puja is beyond religious rituals. No wonder Durga Puja is more a cultural expression than a religious ritual to most Bengalis. And we all know that culture and art walk hand in hand. So expressing the life we are experiencing, through art, during Durga Puja is but natural.
This year we saw a few innovative themes during the Durga puja. This year two pandals stood out for their uniqueness and ingenuity. Both were crowd pullers, but for far different reasons. One was the replica of the tallest tower in the world, the Burj Khalifa. Its grandeur attracted so much crowd that the authorities had to close the pandal for the visitors.
And the other depicted an unnamed mother marginalized by the politics we do. The theme at Barisha Club is poignant for showing a stark reality that we most often forget. While we gleefully advertise the Beti Bachao Scheme, and Kanyashree Scheme, as a society, we systematically ignore the most vulnerable section of society, the women.
In one of the most innovative themes, Durga was depicted as a destitute mother, evicted from her home, carrying all her household belonging in a cart. This Durga is a far cry from the Durga we are accustomed to seeing, a lion riding fierce worrier, going to battle to kill the devil. This Durga is vulnerable and helpless with the way the society is treating her - uprooting her from her small patch of land, as she cannot prove that she belongs to this land. A lot of things are beyond her grasp, yet she doggedly carries on, with hope in her eyes, to take care of her family, which also includes a small Durga idol.
The artist pours into his creation his heart’s anguish and angst. The theme amplifies the precarious existence of a woman living near the international border. Her existence is hanging between life and death. The land which was hers, from the days of her ancestors, is no longer hers. The leaders sitting far away in their citadels, with no feeling for the plight of the people, enacted the law that took her identity away. The draconian law has uprooted her from her land and made her alien in her ancestor’s land. Her home is now the concentration camp, fenced with the barbed wires, without any dignity of a free person.
What is a better occasion to awaken ourselves to the reality of hate and hypocrisy, that we routinely undertake in our daily lives than the Durga Puja?
We worship the Goddess of power, as we place the Devi on a pedestal, and routinely violate her in reality. While we worship the mother in her idol, we routinely abuse her in life.
Kolkata's unique Durga puja themes, its social consciousness, and my musings