Durga puja, the famous festival of Bengalis. A deep fantasy, a deep nostalgia and thousands of feelings are attached to the name of Maa Durga.
This is the one and only festival whose countdown starts 6 months prior to the actual date- Everyone wants it to be the most luxurious and loud.
We are all is fine and are also ready to spend a big amount for these 4 days. . .
Wait !!!
Let me tell you how big!!
4,000-odd Durga Pujas held across the city, including group and private pujas, involve the Rs 123 crores this year. :O Yup! It is THAT big.
Making public, its recent paper on “West Bengal cashing in on Durga Puja celebrations”, the ASSOCHAM said the cost of organizing the puja has increased as much as over 30% compared to previous years, mostly due to the hike in the materials used. “The current size of the Durga Puja industry is about Rs.25000 crore, and is likely to go as high as
Rs.41000 crore by 2016 with its annual growth rate of 35%.”
Around 10,000 MW power is generally used only in Kolkata- Which is not a small quantity of power and also not joke for a state .
As indicated by authorities of Forum for Durgotsav, a stage that speaks to around 200 driving puja coordinators in the city, of the 3,000-odd group pujas, the main 77 went through Rs 20 crores with the rest Rs 103 crore. Of these, four are super spending plan pujas with spendings in abundance of Rs 70 lakh, trailed by 10 major spending plan pujas that spend around Rs 40 lakh, 20 pujas that spend around Rs 30 lakh and 43 pujas that spend Rs 15 lakh on a normal.
“The main pujas that draw 99% of pandal – compete for top respects in all real honor classifications. After that, there are 100-odd hopefuls who join the “must-see” list and to do that they attempt to raise their financial plan and be aggressive,” said Kajal Sarkar, joint secretary of the discussion and lead coordinator of the Puja at Bosepukur Sitala Mandir that has been a top draw and crowd puller for over 10 years now.
The 1,000 medium-size pujas, that make up the following rung, have a normal expenditure of Rs 7 lakh, trailed by 1,000 lodging and bari pujos with normal spending plan of Rs 1.5 lakh on the five days of customs.
Lastly 1,500 small pandals have a normal spending plan of Rs 1.25 lakh.
For greater pujas, the cost acceleration has been still higher. “The financial backing has expanded by no less than 15% because of gratefulness in all costs – from craftsmen conceptualizing the subject to workers developing the pandals to cost of icon, transportation, cost of puja offerings and charge of dhakis,” said Forum for Durgotsav president Nitish Kumar Saha.
Notwithstanding the group pujas, there are around 1,000 pujas sorted out by lodging social orders and at homes in the city that have spending plans extending from Rs 50,000 to Rs 50 lakh. While the normal use is pegged around Rs 1.5 lakh, premium apartment suite buildings like Hiland Park and South City have a financial plan in abundance of Rs 30 lakh with a great part of the assets going into rich suppers for the occupants. While new edifices have profound pockets, numerous homes that have been generally sorting out pujas are discovering it progressively hard to meet the costs of Durga Puja with its elaborate rituals. Even mega and huge spending group pujas have been going extreme and from now after the police’s orders to refuse erection of doors over significant streets- with coordinators not able to erect 500-odd doors, each of which expected to bring a normal of Rs 40,000 from the organizations that publicized on the entryways, the industry is gazing at income loss of Rs 2 crores.
“While there are puja councils that spend near Rs 1 crore, at the flip side of the range are any semblance of us who figure out how to sort out pujas on a shoe-string spending plan of Rs 50,000. In spite of the fact that we attempt to compromise as we can, the consumption has still gone up by 12% this year,” said Tarun Shaw of Hindustan Boys’ Sporting Club.
While a state like West Bengal, which is struggling to offer basic necessity to its people, can’t provide a minimal source of income for lakhs of educated unemployed people, a state, which
is running out of loan from the World Bank, is it really illogical to make such improper over expenditure in the name of celebration?
Please, dear government . . . kindly do think about it.
By NB
