Impoverished children join hands to organise Durga Puja in Kolkata

No, it won't be a grand pandal, nor would it have a startling theme or glamour like the big-ticket Durga Pujas in Kolkata. But a special Durga Puja being organised in south Kolkata by a group of impoverished children will certainly be different.

Alien to the pomp and riches of the city, the little organisers, aged between 10 and 15, have put together everything -- from the idol to the pandal.

While a group of children from a remote village in the Sundarbans called Bhandarkhali helped in making the idol, the thermocol decorations for the pandal were prepared by Saheli Haldar, a class VIII student from Sarberia village in South 24 Paraganas district, who started making flowers with thermocol for pocket money. Children from the Kolkata's red light area would also be lending a hand with the preparations.

The idea came to south Kolkata residents Joydip Mukhopadhyay and his wife Swaguna during the nationwide lockdown and the subsequent Cyclone Amphan when the couple was crisscrossing the state to provide aid to destitute villagers. During one such trip to the Bhandarkhali village in the Sundarbans, they saw the children make clay idols and decorative items with thermocol.

The idol, made by Deb, a student of class VI from Bhandarkhali village, will arrive in Kolkata soon. Deb said he learned how to build clay idols by watching his father. “This is the first idol I've made myself,” he said.

It struck Joydip and Swaguna, who work intensively to promote India's culture tourism in other countries, that the talent of these children should not go unnoticed. They then decided that a special Durga Puja would be held in the yard of an old house in South Kolkata where the four-foot-wide and four-foot-tall pandal, along with the idol and other decorations, would be made by these children.

Swaguna said that the pandal will be decorated with masks, face shields and sanitizer bottles.

“Hopefully it will put a smile on the faces of children amid the pandemic,” said Swaguna told DH.