Oh my God! If not listing Durga Puja in top ten world carnivals means this then what its inclusion will mean. Better not include it! screams Julia an American tourist keyed up by the swarming crowd of pandal hoppers literally bringing the whole mega polis to a standstill.
True Kolkata is bursting at its seams as it does every Pujas. Yet the organsiers of the 4,000-odd Durga Puja committees are outraged at the exclusion of Bengal’s biggest festival from world’s top ten carnivals.
Even the US Consul General Craig Hall would rub his eyes many times over to fathom the length, breadth and depth of the crowd. “It is simply unimaginable. I would never have imagined the existence of such a huge festival had I not joined the Durga Puja viewers,” he said while visiting some of the crowded marquees.
He would definitely apprise his friends to come and have a dekko of the carnival next year, he said after being informed that the most of the Puja pandals recorded anywhere between 5,000 and 18,000 visitors an hour on a normal Puja day.
Kolkata should definitely make for an important tourist destination he said before catching a flight back home. It is indeed a big message of women’s empowerment and preponderance in the society, he maintained.
Notwithstanding, the organisers are livid with the powers that be either in Bengal or in Delhi for cold-shouldering the Pujas. There is a big clamour to include Kolkata’s Dugra Pujas in the world tourism itinerary, not only because of the crowd that it pulls but morestrongly because of the philosophical mysticism and cultural and artistic sublimity it affords in conception and construction of the marquees.
“It is yet another story of deprivation of a whole people,” says Badal Sarkar of Bosepukur Sarbojonin Durga Puja Committee, “that such a big festival and definitely the biggest in the world is not listed among the ten biggest carnivals.”
Sandip of Garia Mitali Sangha says “it is time we raise our voices and realise our demand.” Gouranga Quilla a national award winning artist of Tridhara Sanmilani iterates, “in addition to all other things inclusion of the Pujas in the list will generate employment and encourage art and culture.”
Considering the 5 million footfall at the so-called biggest carnival at Rio or for that matter the other big fests at Mardi Gras, Venice, Notting Hill or Quebec Durga Pujas draw far more crowd 24x7 for more 4-5 days at a stretch, claims a widely travelled Puja organiser at Haati Bagaan.
Durga Puja finds reference in several literature, including Avnirnaya of 11th century, Durgabhaktitarangini by Maithili poet Vidyapati of 14th century. long before Durga Puja was popularised by the Bengali aristocrats and zamindars of the colonial era, the Mother Goddess was worshiped in 6th century Parashurameshvara Temple of Bhubaneswar.
In the modern times first big Puja was organised by the Deb family of Shova Bazaar Raj when they invited lord Clive to witness the Puja and associated Nautch by Baijees of lucknow and Varanasi. Before them the Malla Kings of Vishnupur (recall Visnupur Gharana of art) organised Pujas more than a 1,000 years ago.
The Pujas became a public affair after 12 friends or Barah Yaar from Gupti Para bordering Nadia district organised the people’s Puja which was called Baroari (Barah-yaari) Puja. The public Pujas are still called thus.
No wonder why the bells chime, cymbals clang and invigorating Dhak (drums) beat the big clamour for the big Festival — associated with the Mother’s homecoming — getting listed get louder.