Idol structures being fished out of water at Kumartuli ghat on Sunday afternoon
With around 5,000 Kolkata puja idols being immersed in the Hooghly this year—from Metiabruz to Dakshineswar—KMC and Kolkata Police faced the twin challenges of ensuring safe, orderly and relatively noiseless immersions and clearing tonnes of idol materials before they could pollute the river. You Can Also Check: Gold Rate in Kolkata | Silver Rate in Kolkata | Bank Holidays in Kolkata | Public Holidays in Kolkata | Kolkata AQI | Weather in Kolkata | Petrol Price in Kolkata | Diesel Price in Kolkata | CNG Price in Kolkata | LPG Price in Kolkata Stay updated with the latest Kolkata news.
“The real challenge is not only to remove the idols immediately after immersion but also to ensure the materials do not remain in the river or find their way back into the water,” said a KMC official. “The clean-up must continue until the ghats and the adjoining banks are completely cleared,” said environment activist Naba Dutta. Once retrieved and dried, many can be repaired and reused instead of making new frameworks from scratch,” said Bhaba Paul, a Kumartuli artisan. Flowers, synthetic decorations, plastic and other non-biodegradable materials must be collected and segregated before they enter the river,” Datta said.
At several locations, portions of idol structures remained in shallow water near the banks, while piles of bamboo, straw, flowers and decorative materials were strewn along the ghats. The sheer scale of this year’s immersions has made the task particularly daunting. Civic workers have to retrieve idol remains from the river, segregate reusable materials and transport the rest to designated disposal sites. But amid the piles of discarded materials, an informal recycling economy remains a silver lining. Along the Hooghly, reusable kathamos — the basic bamboo and straw framework on which idols are sculpted — are routinely salvaged after immersion. Many find their way back to artisans, who use them to create idols for subsequent pujas. “These bamboo structures are valuable to idol-makers. Environmentalists, like Subhas Datta, believed this traditional practice could become an important component of a more organised post-immersion waste-management system. “Reusing kathamos reduces the demand for fresh bamboo and other materials. But recycling alone cannot solve the problem. Download the TOI App.
Kolkata: A day after the final round of immersion of Durga idols on Saturday, several major ghats on Sunday remained partially cleaned, with half-submerged structures, bamboo frames, straw and discarded puja paraphernalia still scattered on the banks of the Hooghly. A spot survey by TOI on Sunday found that while much of the immersion residue had been removed, the clean-up was still underway at Baje Kadamtala, Bagbazar and Kumartuli ghats.