The Bong-connection

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Of my memories of Durga Puja at Calcutta, the first thing that comes to my mind is waking up, at an ungodly hour of four in the morning on Mahalaya, to the mesmeric voice of Birendra Kumar Bhadra’s' Mahishasura Mardini', playing in the background on the radio The goose-flesh that it never failed to bring, the eerie sense of calmness that overcame and the dawning realization that it was just seven days to the grandest festival of them all!

Durga Puja; a festival celebrating the Grande Dame’s home-coming from her heavenly abode. It lasts over the span of five glorious days and every Bengali the world over awaits it with bated breath. Though necessarily a religious affair, Durga Puja is actually a carnival of merrymaking amongst Calcuttans.

It is not easy to comprehend the fervor this festival brings to the average Calcuttan. It is Holi, Diwali, Valentine’s Day - all rolled into one. Even the Cricket and Football World Cups do not hold as much consequence for the Calcuttan as much as this five-day annual fiesta does.

For someone who’s never been a part of these festivities it is difficult to create an exact picture of the grandeur and for the person who has saw it even once…it is an experience of a lifetime.

It is not hard to identify the City with its oft quoted sobriquet during the extent of these days… Lapierre’s ‘City of Joy’ is in fact jubilant without bounds. Enjoyment is the uniform civil code.

From whichever corner you look at it, the city glows like the very clichéd bride. The incandescent bulbs adorning the buildings, the cascades of twinkling lights, the psychedelic roadside illumination, the myriad colored marquees locally called ‘pandals’, the painted faces of the striking idols, the resounding dhaks, the blaring microphones, the pulsating crowds, the bustling lanes, the pomp, the splendor, of the biggest spectacle of the year, is a vision to behold.

The first day of Puja (the sixth day of the Navratra) a multitude of crowd descends on the streets, hopping from one pandal to the other, marveling at its ingenious designs and sheer creativity of the artisans. While the larger part of the nation is fasting, the boulevards in Calcutta are filled with an invigorating smell, which wafts out of the make-shift food stalls.

With their DSLRs or their flash-enabled camera phones, in their new apparel of the season’s a la mode, comes out the cavalcade of men and women, to haunt the roads till the wee hours of the morning. There is the kurta- denim clad young fellow, the quintessential bhadrolok in his white dhoti and panjabi, the lady clad in her silk finest, the young belle in the latest Gudda or in a splendid knock-off from New Market and the children in their charming outfits. The city resembles a runway straight off a fashion week, where the young and old, the cosmopolitan and the rustic, the prosaic and the vibrant dish themselves out in a kaleidoscope of hues.

Come Durga Puja it is said, you can take a person out of Calcutta but not Calcutta out of a person. It is that time of the year when the exiled Calcuttan yearns to go home. When listening to Bengali music or even a lavish Bengali spread, at a Michelin Star restaurant is insufficient to drive away the heaviness in the heart.

With pujo round the corner I can’t help but stir up the sights and sounds of my city that have always bewitched me. The hubble-bubble of the crowd, the upbeat atmosphere, the cackle of nerves, the gaggle of friends, the racket of the paper horns, the gurgle of mirth, the rhythmic strain of the dhaks, the heady smell of dhuno, the coquettish looks, the appreciative glances, the never-ending queues in front of eateries, the night long sojourn down the winding lanes of North Calcutta, the aching feet and the adda at Maddox!

Otherwise quite the skeptic, the ‘Spirit of Puja’ brings out the fanatic in me. However many may I have been present for, ‘Asche bochor Abaar Hobe’ (Next year it shall happen again) always has a resounding ring to me.

So after a long wait in exile, I am homeward bound in a day’s time and only one thought flits across my mind, “Maa, I’m coming home!”