The Celebrations of Those Who Left Home

     6^th of October, 2011, Thursday, was the last day of this year’s Durga Puja. We call it VijayaDashami (Bijoya Doshomi...keeping true to the Bong pronunciation). I was whiling away time, sitting inside the pandal of the Pune Camp Durgotsav, watching the colourful mayhem. (I don’t think “Pandal” is a proper English word...its one of our many lingual gifts to the Queen’s language. The English word for Pandal is “marquee”)

The ladies were busy stuffing the divine Goddess’s mouth with sweetmeats and smearing vermillion on Her hair parting, so that She doesn’t forget the hospitality She received at Her parent’s home and that She remembers Her marital status and behaves in a manner becoming of a married lady with Her forgetful, ash smeared, tiger skin clad, yogi of a husband. And then, after the ladies promptly reminded each other that they all are married too (by smearing vermillion on one another - Shindoor Khela), it was time for our dear Goddess to leave us and embark on the journey back to Her husband’s place. (She must have had a gala time with us here, in this beautiful mellow October weather,away from the freezing peaks of Kailash, where She lives with her absentminded husband Shiva.)

     Here in Pune, along with the Goddess, it was time for Mansoor Dhaaki, who beats the dhaak (the dholak like instrument, only bigger, which is an integral part of all Durga Pujas and has amazing potential of making you nostalgic & homesick as well as driving you mad, with its sound) to go back to his native place, Murshidabad (West Bengal).  Satwant Singh, the tall and burly Sardar, who was in charge of managing the queues at the Pune Camp Durgotsav for these five days, will now return to his duties. Dr. Khan will get back to his clinic, attending to people’s teeth (for he is a dentist) and Mr. Iyer will now resume his desk job at some important state government office. Mrs Pandey, who chopped kilos of fruits meticulously, every single day during the Puja and blew the conch shell whenever the purohit (who arrived all the way from Calcutta) asked her to, will now go back to her duties of playing the perfect wife and gracious hostess of the parties at the Army Officer’s club. She will also resume her role as an active member of the Pune chapter of AWWA (Army Wives’ Welfare Association). I too will return to my mundane life, till the Goddess comes to pay us a visit again next year.

Durga Puja is the one of the times in the entire year when I regret living so far away from Calcutta. But thankfully, there is no dearth of Durga Pujas, conducted in the most authentic fashion, here in Pune. 
However, the most noticeable part of the Durga Puja here in the Pune Cantonment where I live, is the immense involvement of people from all communities and religions.

     All the five evenings, from Panchami to Navami were replete with colourful, entertaining and sometimes downright hilarious programs. On Panchami evening Mr. Iyer, who hails from Tamilnadu, and somehow got associated with the group that organises this Puja every year , recited Chandi Paath (a beautiful Sanskrit invocation to the Goddess) followed by a musical soiree by the AWWA ladies. On Shashthi evening, the local Army band played popular songs followed by a hilarious skit, under the direction of Dr. Khan. (I missed Saptami as I was down with fever and Ashtami evening I went to another Durgotsav in the city). Navami night at the Pune Camp Durgostav was again full of songs and dances, this time only to make us hold our breath and clap our hearts out as the specially abled youngsters (who attend a special school run by a local NGO), presented a complicated Tagore dance drama, Shyama, with meticulous perfection!!

      Many of them weren’t Bengalis. Quite a few not Hindus either. What was it then, which brought so many people, who weren’t even related to each other, together, under the warm and gentle gaze of the Goddess, sharing a few moments of simple, wholesome and unadulterated enjoyment, before we all went our own ways till the next year’s Puja?

      Mansoor Dhaki, pulls a rickshaw for most of the year in Murshidabad, but came all the way down to the Pune Camp Durgotsav in Pune, this year to play the dhaak. He has learnt the art of playing Dhaak from his father who in turn picked it up from his...and so on. It runs in their family, he says, playing dhaak at Durga Pujas. He doesn’t even remember what his actual family surname is, for they have been called Dhaki since the time of his great grandfather. He has been to the Durga Puja festivities in Allahabad, Kanpur, Jodhpur and Indore, beating the dhaak. Now, he’ll go back to Murshidabad. Till, next year, some other association organising Durga Puja, will need his services and summon him to another state.

      Auntie Agnes is a widow. So old that probably you can’t get any older. Yet, I have never failed to notice her each year for the last 8 years that I am here, sitting by herself in the Pune Camp Durgotsav pandal on Dashami morning. Looking like a small white mouse in her paisley printed calf length dress, she carries a rather English looking cookie tin in her old hands. She hails from Panjim, Goa. Her son, Percy Fernandes,has just got a job here in Pune. He dutifully brings his old mother along every year. This year Percy volunteered to help in managing the crowd during the Thakur Boron (farewell to the Goddess by married women) and immersion.

Though I have never done so myself (a little odd behaviour in a 25 year old, I think), after the Goddess is taken for immersion on Dashami, I have noticed that children playing around in the pandal playfully say “Shubho Bijoya” to Auntie Agnes, probably thinking she won’t understand what they are saying and it’ll be a great joke to laugh about. But every year, she hands out chocolate cookies to all the kids who wish her VijayaDashami.

     Mr. Roy, who is a civil servant, currently posted in Pune, has been sponsoring one entire day’s Puja here, for the last three years. His family is in West Bengal. There is no doubt that he misses them sorely. But he can’t take long vacations and visit them often. So it is this Pune Camp Durgotsav, which makes him feel a wee bit closer home, with all its loud camaraderie, sights and sounds.

     This, perhaps, is the harmony fostered by transferable jobs that pull you out of the comfort zone of your hometown. The pain of separation from your hometown and your own people and the feeling of loneliness in a strange city, perhaps, binds you even tighter to all those who you find to be in a similar situation. And then, perhaps, your definition of “own people” starts changing and broadening. (Is this what those ancient people, who had laid down the rule that the Durga Puja will be an “open to public”, social celebration and not a do-it-yourself affair in the remote corners of individual residences, had in their foresighted minds?).

     May be, what makes staying away from Calcutta during our biggest festival endurable are these small but meaningful intermittent interminglings we have with one another - like when my mother greets Beejal auntie (a newly married Gujarati lady who comes to the Pune Camp Durgotsav) and smears vermillion on her hair parting, exchanging sweets made of milk..........like when another lot of unruly kids run to Auntie Agnes and say “Shubho Bijoya!” in a singsong tone and she merely blinks, smiles and hands out chocolate cookies.........like when Arindam Mukherjee, a young IT professional , helping others with lifting up the heavy clay idol of Durga for immersion shouts out to his fellow mate “ Rahman, pull the idol up from the left, yaar! Move it, man!”

I think this is one of the reasons why She comes to us year after year. To make sure we all are bound tightly to each other, in bonds of mutual comfort away from our homes.


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PS-  As a very young girl, in Calcutta, watching from the balcony of my residence, I would burst out crying when they took the idol of Durga away for immersion. The year long wait seemed impossible. I always asked my mom, “Why can’t we just keep her all year round, like they keep idols in a temple? Why can’t we have Durga Puja for the entire year?”. My mom always replied, “How can she come back if she doesn’t go away?" 
Today I know, She is the perfect Atithi (guest). She will come, charm everybody, fill everyone’s lives with joy and celebrations while she is here and demand everybody’s attention....but under no circumstances will she overstay her visit. She goes so that we yearn for her to come back...for your return is only significant when you first go away.