Navi Mumbai: As the season of Durga is back, various Bengali associations of Navi Mumbai are busy celebrating the festival in great grandeur. The Vashi based Navi Mumbai Bengali Association (NMBA) which has always been the one to have the highest budget in the city for Durga Pooja celebration, has continued to keep up the achievement with Rs 2 crore as its budget this year.
For the 45th year of Durga Pooja celebration, NMBA decided to have the complete decoration by Shola - a dried milky-white spongey plant matter from Aeschynomene species. “This year, the theme that we decided to have is of ‘peace’ which is currently the need of the hour in the world. We have regular morning pooja and cultural events in the evening. An average of two lakh people visit the Pandal every day,” Sukanto Nag, President of NMBA, said.
With around 120 stalls in the Pandal that is organized from CIDCO exhibition centre, NMBA has only private visitors with passes who are either the members or friends and relatives of the members who get the passes. “Since last 20 years we have the pooja as a private affair. This year for the cultural events, we have Amit Sana, Anupam Roy, Akriti Kakar and Abhijeet Bhattacharya as singers for the cultural events,” Nag added. Initially held from a ground at sector 1 in Vashi, since last six years, it has been shifted to CIDCO Exhibition center. The idol of Durga at NMBA is 18 feet tall.
The Durga Pooja by Seawood Cultural Welfare Association which has been conducting Durga Pooja since last 16 years has got the highest number of stalls this year-30. Usually, the association has 20 odd stalls only. The association this year had partnered with Nexus Mall by doing a show on October 2 depicting Bengali culture to the Mall visitors for around one and half hour. This year, they also tied up with the students from Bharatiya Vidyapeeth who are interning with the association for various work.
“This year, we have depicted Kedarnath Temple as the Pandal decoration,” Goutam Chakraborty, Cultural Secretary of the association said. With around 20 lakh budget, the association, this year has an idol of 12 feet and has around 50,000 people visiting every day in the evening for the cultural events happening at the pandal at Ganpat TAndel ground in Seawood.
The 39 year old Nerul Bengali Association from Nerul has always had a simple Durga Pooja in the building that belongs to them in sector 5 of Nerul.
“We have believed in focusing on the pooja and bhog instead of the other things. We celebrate the festival every year in a simple manned just like how the Rajas of Kolkata celebrated in their homes,” Amit Bhattacharya, priest of the association, said.
The secretary of the association, Jyotirmoy Chakraborty informed that the budges of the pooja this year was Rs 6 lakh with around three stalls and an idol of nine feet height.
For Ulwe Bengali Welfare Trust, this year has a special importance as they have finally got a location to conduct the pooja for at least next five years. The trust has been conducting Durga pooja since six years but was registered only in the year 2020.
“We have always faced issues of space to conduct the pooja but this year we have been provided with the ground of St Wilfred School at sector 2 in Ulwe which they said would provide us for next five years. Due to this location, we are getting good response this year,” Debasis Das, Vice President of the Trust, said.
With around Rs 16 lakh budget, the Ulwe group has managed to get around 18 stalls and 15 feet idol. “This year we have got the idol with the whole family of goddess Durga that is her siblings- Ganapati, Karthik, Saraswati and Lakshmi. This year, we have also chosen bio degradable jewellery including for the crown of the idol using Shola jewellery. Usually they get a crowd of 1000 people visiting the Pandal but with the strategic location, this year, the footfall has gone upto 1500."
