![]() ![]() Now, Durga Puja allows Bengali Hindus to celebrate folk crafts and local culture. In the early twentieth century, the worship of Durga idols in the autumnal months would bring Bengali Hindus together as a community, promoting solidarity and facilitating anti-colonial resistance movements. Durga idols sculpted in these workshops play an especially crucial role in the life of the Bengali Hindus. The Kumartuli workshops supply idols that are worshipped in various Hindu festivals across the world. The workshop space is an extension of the idol-making family’s household and the idols sculpted in the workshop reflect the family’s aesthetic. ![]() They produce idols under labels-“Rakhal Chandra Rudra Pal & Sons,” “Gora Chand Paul & Sons”-that identify the family or the ghar of artisans. This is because every workshop in the neighborhood belongs to a specific family of idol-makers. There are also subtle stylistic differences among the idols carved in the different workshops, which are colloquially called ghar or houses. The idols vary in size: Some are small enough to fit in the palm of one’s hand, others are more than ten feet tall. A walk through Kumartuli at any time of the year offers one a glimpse of idols in various stages of completion. The neighborhood has been home to my father’s family since the 1940s, and my earliest memories are of strolling past rows of idols-that is, clay models of gods such as Durga, Kali, and Krishna-drying under the sun. This artisans’ colony is a remnant of the colonial era, when the British divided the northern parts of Kolkata, which they called “Black Town,” into caste-based quarters for communities of skilled workers. The narrow alleys of Kumartuli, a neighborhood in the metropolitan city of Kolkata, are flanked by thatched workshops in which artisans carve clay models of Hindu gods. ![]()
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