Photo by Indranil Das Devotees offering prayer on the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi at Shree Siddhi Vinayak Devasthanam on Muktaram Babu Street in Kolkata on Monday.
“We have been organising Ganesh Puja for the last 11 years. At East Mall Adhibasi Brinda near Haldirams Crossing on VIP Road, organisers said they could not perform the puja for the last two years due to pressure from the local Trinamool Congress leadership, helmed by Debraj Chakraborty.
Hence, we started with Ganesh Puja and in the future, if manpower and funds permit, we will organise other pujas as well,” said joint secretary Subha Shaw. People have started connecting with the Ganesh festivities over the last few years, and so we have also started organising it this year,” said club member Barun Das. “After the change in govt, we are organising the puja again, and CM Suvendu Adhikari inaugurated it on Saturday,” said Swapan Roychowdhury, chief patron of the puja. But this year, we have taken it to a higher scale,” said a puja organiser.
For some neighbourhood clubs, this year marks their first foray into Ganesh Puja. At Nimtala Sebayan on BK Pal Avenue in north Kolkata, organisers have started the puja for the first time, calling their celebration ‘Sutanutir Maharaja’. “Ours is a small club and what better way to start a puja than with Ganesh Puja? In Behala, Vivekananda Sporting Club has also added Ganesh Puja to its calendar for the first time. “We used to start the festive calendar with Vishwakarma Puja. But this year, we are holding Ganesh Puja as well. The growing scale is also reflected in the themes. At Maniktala, one puja has created a 55ft-high installation of Hanuman, shown tearing open his chest to reveal Lord Ram, with Ganesh depicted in the form of Ram.
The puja was inaugurated by state BJP president Shamik Bhattacharya on Saturday.