While it is usual for Kolkata to steal the show during Durga puja with inventive idols, Agartala seems to have pipped the city of joy for the topmost attraction.
What better to lure a lakh people in a day than the “Golden Durga”, gleaming in guilded fabrics and fiber glasses. The crown with original American diamond and 22-Karat gold jewelleries seem to have produced the desired effect: turning the Puja watchers’ attention to the Tripura capital. The Rs 4 crore concept of “Sworna Durga” has been fashioned by an Agartala-based community of Puja organisers: the Chattrabandu Club. “They are real. But we would not be able to say if this is the most expensive Durga Puja in the country,”
Secretary of the Puja organising committee Ashok Ghosh admitted when Deccan Herald asked him about the authenticity of the golden ornaments and American diamonds on display.
“All that we would say is that this has been a unique project for which we had to raise large sums. People contributed enormously, while the jewellery and the crown have been donated by a noted Kolkata jeweller. We had to pay a security deposit for that,” Ghosh added.
While noted artist Indrajit Poddar from Habra in West Bengal created the idols, the pandal has been made by Chinese gold-plated fabrics.
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