The artisans at veteran sculptor Vijay Khatu's workshop had begun crafting the idols from as early as July. When the final finishing touches are in place, the goddesses will travel to pandals in Parel, Lalbaug, Chinchpokli and Santa Cruz. "Even when Ganpati season is on, we have to keep some time aside to make the Durga idols," said artisan Satish Valivedekar. "There are so many orders now, we need to work well in advance."
The mushrooming of pandals across city neighbourhoods has almost doubled their assignments over the past few years, he said. Each pandal wants to pull in the maximum crowds, and this demands not only unique designs, but a whole crop of "attractions" around the festival.
In Vashi, the Navi Mumbai Bengali Association (NMBA) plans to put up a 60-foot-model of the Statue of Liberty, made with 85,000 environmentally friendly LED lights, while the Bombay Durgabari Samiti's festivities at Gowalia Tank include a Bengali play, performed by 70 inmates from Kolkata's correctional homes.
The city's oldest puja at Bengal Club in Dadar features another one of its customary lavish sets -this time of the Bishnupur temple, with over two lakh terracotta tiles, shipped in from Kolkata's Bankura district -and the Lokhandwala Durgotsav's roster comprises performances by Bollywood singers, rows of dhunuchi dancers, and Bengali feasts catered by celebrated chefs like Anjan Chatterjee. The sheer scale and flamboyance of festivities, propelled by a glut of corporate sponsorships has made Durga Puja a massive marketing platform, otherwise the domain of the Ganesh season.
The Lokhandwala Durgotsav claims to be the "biggest, best and the costliest", though Andheri, the city's Durga Puja hub, has over a dozen sarvajanik and private pandals jockeying for footfalls. Playback singer Abhijit Bhattacharya, who organises the event, refuses to mention their budget but talks about how the puja also serves as a massive advertising platform. "The beauty is that multi-national companies could not do their branding (better) anywhere," he said. "So keeping that in mind, I have created this event where all the big brands, the multi-national brands participate." At the NMBA, general secretary rattled off the list of sponsors like Larsen and Toubro, State Bank of India and Senco jewellery, while another member of a prominent city pandal narrated, on condition of anonymity, how the marketing team of a milk-products company "literally begged" for a stall. "They were selling mishti doi, and with hundreds of Bengalis attending the puja, this is a captive market," he said. Sushmita Mitra, organiser at Gowalia Tank's pandal, said that though the festival was getting commercialised over the years, advertising was crucial to sustain the festivities. "We have more than 3,000 people having bhog every day and that is a huge expenditure," she explained. "It has grown over the years, and advertisements, banners, souvenirs organised by companies are necessary to raise funds."
The Durga Puja celebrations in Mumbai today are a long way off from the quieter, more family-bound affairs that he grew up attending in Kolkata, said Bengal Club president Utpal Mukhopadhyay. A growing number of Bengalis setting up home here, along with the youth from both within and outside the community enthusiastically joining in, have helped amp up the scale of celebrations.
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