With Durga Puja 45 days away, Kumartuli going through busiest time in year

Time was when the idol-makers of Kumartuli didn’t quite mind camera-carrying visitors because their arrival meant a little publicity for the idol-makers.

Today, the arrival of camera-wielding visitors means publicity for the visitors themselves — in the form of Instagram reels and YouTube videos — and therefore the artisans are not as welcoming as before. As a result, both remain busy with work — the artisans giving finishing touches to the Durga idols and the visitors recording the craftmanship while keeping themselves in the foreground.

With exactly 45 days to go for Durga Puja — not even that, considering that these days pandal-hopping begins long before religious activities begin — Kumartuli, the iconic north Kolkata neighbourhood that is one of the oldest in the city, is going through the busiest time of the year anyway. The only artisans who are relatively free are those who make fibreglass idols to be sent abroad: most idols have already been shipped.

“By ship it takes about two and a half months for consignments to reach their destination, so most of our orders have already been dispatched. A few orders for smaller idols were received late, they will be going by air. This year we made about 30 sets of idols; two of them went to Dubai and the remaining to Europe and the US,” said Mahesh Das, who works at the shop of Kaushik Ghosh, a well-known fibreglass artist in Kumartuli.

An artisan at work.
| Photo Credit:
Bishwanath Ghosh

This year sashti — the day the idols get consecrated and the five-day rituals begin — falls on September 28. Also this year, the Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal has hiked the grant given to Puja committees — there are over 40,000 in the State — from ₹85,000 to ₹1.10 lakh.

Indrajit Paul, who makes traditional clay idols, is also serving Bengalis abroad this year by sending them artworks that decorate the idols. “That box of goddess’ ornaments, I am sending them to Ohio tomorrow. I could have taken a few orders from abroad but the price they were offering was too less. My father, Krishna Paul, was one of the first artisans to make a Durga idol that was sent abroad. He made it out of paper pulp — this was some 45 years ago,” Mr. Paul said.

He is content with the 12 orders he received locally, and is particularly proud of the set of idols he is working on for a pandal in New Town. “This Durga will have 3D eyes; if you look at her eyes under illumination, you will feel as if light is emerging from her eyes. I have used American diamond to achieve that effect. It’s my most expensive work this year. I am also finishing a Ganesha at the moment for Vinayaka Chaturthi,” he said.

To finish idols in time for Durga Puja — each set includes idols of the goddess’s four children — artisans usually begin work sometime in March. Most often, like this year, they have rains to deal with during the monsoon, when work slows down due to the weather.

“When it is raining frequently, what takes a day to complete takes two days. As a result, I have to pay overtime to my workers. But these are problems we have always been dealing with,” Mr. Paul said.