Durga Puja in Kolkata — A Truly Unique Indian Street Festival
The thing I was most looking forward to when I moved to India was experiencing firsthand the rich cultural morass of this ancient country. Last week, I had the opportunity to do just that when I travelled to Kolkata, West Bengal, and experienced the Durga Puja street festival.
Durga Puja is a truly unique street festival that is a caricature of what makes India remarkable. It is a combination of an art festival, a street food fair, city-wide concert, religious event and I heard a prime time to fraternize (for those who may be so inclined).
The Durga Puja festival is the most important festival of West Bengal. This is not a personal superlative, the Government of West Bengal said as much in their submission to UNESCO who subsequently Inscribed the event on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity 2021.
The event marks the worship of the Hindu mother-goddesss Durga and her victory over the deceptive, demon Mahishasura. As I understand it, according to Hindu scripture the demon was granted a boon from the devas (similar to gods). This boon meant that the demon could not be killed by any man. This demon subsequently went into battle with the devas and proceeded to terrorize the world. In response, the devas banded together and combined their divine energies, birthing Durga. This mother goddess went on to defeat the demon, and it is this moment that is immortalized during Durga Puja all across Kolkata.
All across the city, depictions of this event are displayed through clay sculptures. Mother Durga holds aloft, in her 10 outstretched arms, the weapons of the various devas who whose energies were combined in her creation. She is flanked by her four children and stands aloft, in victory pose, over a cowering and defeated demon, Mahishasura. On the first official day of Durga Puja, the Durga’s eyes are painted invoking her life, and after five days the clay images are immersed in the river.
The streets of Kolkata essentially shut down for the event. The 5-day street festival is a 24-hour event in which folks from all walks of life go ‘pandal hopping’. Pandals, which are typically temporary structures, are constructed by communities all across the city to house their Durga clay images. We viewed some very humble pandals in slum-like areas, and some pandals that imagination could not even concoct.
The communities that prepare these pandals have historic rivalries as they seek to outdo each other in the flamboyance (and apparently cost) of their pandals. There is also a very competitive judging process. The winners from this context proudly display their trophies next to their pandals.
We went pandal hopping at different times of the day. Irrespective of the hour people were out and about, dressed to impress and enjoying the craftsmanship, creativity and beauty of both the pandals and the depictions of Mother Durga.
Walking around Kolkata for Durga Puja is like no other experience I have been fortunate to be a part of. There is the constant beating of drums that permeate all corners and hours of the day. Street food is sizzling away, and the visual senses are bombarded with flashing lights. People are in a joyous mood and traffic gives way to pedestrians (a rarity in this country).
Around any corner, we could be confronted with a remarkable art installation. Around one corner we were faced with what I thought was an ancient temple in the middle of an intersection which turned out to be a temporary structure.
In another part of the town a residential building had been constructed in the middle of the street, over three-stories high. The structure was so-believable, that even up close it was hard to accept that the building had not stood for decades. Papier-mache characters were seen standing on the temporary balconies representing a famous character from a Bengali comic.
We saw a pandal that paid homage to the plight of garment workers and the trends of quick fashion. Inside, the clay depiction of Durga was in the style of Van Gogh’s Starry Night. The clay figure would not be out of place in the Metropolitan Museum or any other high-art gallery. Yet, this was completely open to the public, no tickets, no questions asked, no dress-code.
Another pandal had a psychedelic depiction of a human head that would not have been out of place at Tomorrowland. The pandal provided social commentary on the role of social media on mental health, a modern topic for an ancient festival.
A pandal had been constructed over a lake in the form of a grotto with a wooden walkway. The grotto has been created in a manner that made it look completely natural within the surroundings.
On our first night, we found ourselves in the middle of a huge crush of people. As we surged forward with the crowd we were surprised to find that an Indian cricketer, Venkatesh Iyer, was on a stage next to a Pandal with a TV crew. Next to him was an oversized, chair-style structure and a completely bonkers sun-goddess style depiction of Mother Durga.
There are over 5,000 pandals that are painstakingly designed, constructed and finally immersed in Kolkata. This extravagance and show of wealth and artistic creativity is juxtaposed against scenes of slums and dire poverty. On the final day, as we pandal hopped early in the morning, we found ourselves in a slum community that abutted some of the most extravagant pandals in the Maddox Square area. We found homeless men sleeping next to the pandals and people picking through waste and refuse. It was a stark reminder of the reality of life in Kolkata, the adopted home of Mother Teresa herself.
If you ever have the opportunity to visit Kolkata, I highly recommend you take it. The Durga Puja is a completely unique street festival that you will never forget.
Special thanks to Subha Ganguly, Arkadeep Bandyopadhyay, Luke Butcher and Jocelyn Chokkattu for the photos, great company, tour guiding and addas :)