Join the new world

Bajlo tomar alor benu
Matlo je bhuban
Aaj prabhate se sur shune khule dinu mon
Antare jaaaa lukiye raji
Arun binayai se sur baje
Ai ananda jagye sabaar madhuro amantran
Aj samiran
Alloy pagol
Nabino surero binay
Aaj sharater aakaasho binay ganero mala bilay
Tomay hara
Jibono mamo
Tomari aloi nirupama
Bhoreo pakhi uthe gahi tomari bandana

Durga Puja, this two words fills the soul of any bengali with joy.. Known as Bangalir Mohotsob(Greatest festival of the Bengalis) this festival is no longer just a festival for bongs... Durga Puja is a global festival now thanks to globalisation.. If you can get 12 bengalis in one one place they are sure to start a durga puja.. According to the puranas Lord Ram offered the puja to goddess Durga at this time of the year instead of the usual spring time thus this festival is also called Akal bodhon. Another instersting fact is Lord Ram's enemy Raavan himself acted as the priest in disguise for this puja even though this puja was being conducted to defeat him..

Durga Puja was an integral part of the nationalist movement in pre partition bengal.. In many places the revolutionaries worshipped Bharat mata as Ma Durga... They even gave mahisashur the face of contemporary british offials leading to ban on such pujas..
According to the Indian mythology the asur named Mahishahsur or the Buffalo Demon impressed Lord Bramha with his rigorous praying and meditation who gave the asur the boon that he couldn't be killed by any male... This literally made him invulnerable and he defeated the devas to conquer the swarlok.. The devas thus homeless went to the trinity, Lord Bramha, Vishnu and Shiva who combined all of their powers and thus the ten armed Goddess Durga was created... The gods armed her with their best weapon and the great himalaya provided her bahana the lion.. Goddess Durga attacked the asurs and vanquished all of them but Mahisashur.. The demon fought the goddess for a long time but was getting overwhelmed.. Finally the goddess impaled the demon with her trishul ending his tyranny for good..

The first grand worship of Goddess Durga in recorded history is said to have been celebrated in the late 1500s. Folklores say the landlords, or zamindar, of Dinajpur and Malda initiated the first Durga Puja in Bengal. According to another source, Raja Kangshanarayan of Taherpur or Bhabananda Mazumdar of Nadiya organized the first Sharadiya or Autumn Durga Puja in Bengal in the year 1606.

The origin of the community puja can be credited to the twelve friends of Guptipara in Hoogly, West Bengal, who collaborated and collected contributions from local residents to conduct the first community puja called the 'baro-yaari' puja, or the 'twelve-pal' puja, in 1790.

The baro-yaari puja was brought to Kolkata in 1832 by Raja Harinath of Cossimbazar, who performed the Durga Puja at his ancestral home in Murshidabad from 1824 to 1831, notes Somendra Chandra Nandy in 'Durga Puja: A Rational Approach' published in The Statesman Festival, 1991.

"The baro-yaari puja gave way to the sarbajanin or community puja in 1910, when the Sanatan Dharmotsahini Sabha organized the first truly community puja in Baghbazar in Kolkata with full public contribution, public control and public participation. Now the dominant mode of Bengali Durga Puja is the 'public' version," write M. D. Muthukumaraswamy and Molly Kaushal in Folklore, Public Sphere, and Civil Society. The institution of the community Durga Puja in the 18th and the 19th century Bengal contributed vigorously to the development of Hindu Bengali culture.

The traditional icon of the goddess worshiped during the Durga Puja is in line with the iconography delineated in the scriptures. In Durga, the Gods bestowed their powers to co-create a beautiful goddess with ten arms, each carrying their most lethal weapon.

The tableau of Durga also features her four children--Kartikeya, Ganesha, Saraswati and Lakshmi. Traditional clay image of Durga ,or pratima, made of clay with all five gods and goddesses under one structure is known as 'ek-chala' ('ek' = one, 'chala' = cover).

There are two kinds of embellishments that are used on clay--sholar saaj and daker saaj. In the former, the pratima is traditionally decorated with the white core of the shola reed which grows within marshlands. As the devotees grew wealthier, beaten silver (rangta) was used. The silver used to be imported from Germany and was delivered by post (dak). Hence the name daker saaj.

The huge temporary canopies--held by a framework of bamboo poles and draped with colorful fabric --that house the icons are called 'pandals'. Modern pandals are innovative, artistic and decorative at the same time, offering a visual spectacle for the numerous visitors who go 'pandal-hopping' during the four days of Durga Puja.

Many consider Devi Durga as an incarnation of Devi Parvati... Thus durga puja is considered the time when she visits her father's house with her children in another tradition.. Sasthi, Saptami, Ashtami and Navami is celebrated with great passion and grandeur.. Finally on the eve of vijaya dashami everybody has tears in their eyes during the immersion of the idol while chanting,"Abar eso Ma" requesting her to come again the next year... After immersions people touch the feet of their elders, hug their contemporaries and bless their youngers with a prosperous life.. Sweets are exchanged as the people await the arrival of their very own Uma again next year...

I wish all of you a happy, prosperous and safe Durga Puja..

[img]https://ibb.co/ho4pdk[/img]