Kumortuli- Heritage of Bengal

Only few days are left for Durga Puja, the most important festival of State of West Bengal, in India. The preparations for Durga Puja are getting underway everywhere with erection of pandals (Temporary structure made of bamboo and tripols) and their decorations.The artists are busy giving final touches to the idols of Goddess  Durga and her four children Lakshmi (Goddess of Wealth), Swaraswati (Goddess of Knowledge and Music), Kartick ( Chief Commander of Army of Heavens) and Ganesh (Symbol of wisdom) . It is my passion to visit Kumortuli before the Puja to see the final stages of making of idols of  Maa (Mother) Durga. I visited Kumortuli six or seven days before Puja and took many photograph of finishing touches on idols of Maa Durga. In these area the lanes are very narrow and shabby. The studios of artisans are in a very distressing condition, Inspite of these they create beautiful idols of Devi Durga every year. 

History of Kumortuli

Kumortuli means Potter’s locality. ‘Kumor’ means Potter and ‘Tuli’ means locality. This area is located in the  northern part  Kolkata (Calcutta) City, very close to the river Bhagirathi.  One of the earliest reference Kumortuli was found in Harry Evan Auguste Cotton’s  (Mr. Cotton’s was a barrister, administrator, Journalist, Historians and writer) book ‘Calcutta Old & New’ and also in the Journal ‘The Bengal Consultations’ ( in an issue of  1707 A.D).

The first Kumors or Potters came from Krishnagar in Nadia District and settled in the Govindapur Village (Central part of present Kolkata) on the banks of the river Bhagirathi. When the East India Company took over the land to build Fort Willam at Govindapore, the inhabitants migrated from there and settle down at Sutanuti (Northern part of Present Kolkata). John Holwell, a East India Company’s agent under instructions from higher authority allotted separate districts to the company’s workmen of different categories and the places were named according to the nature of profession of the inhabitants, like  Suripara (Place of wine-seller’s), Maidaputty (Flour market), Molunga (Place of salt-works), Aheeritollah (Cowherds quarters) and Kumortuli (Potter’s quaters). At that time the aristocratic families of Kolkata used to hire these Potter’s or craft men for decorating their homes with fairies, angels and idols of their ancestors following British traditions.

Some 200 to 250 years back Zaminders  (Land Lords) and rich people residing at Kolkata started organising Durga Puja in their house and for this purpose idols of Maa Durga were constructed  at the ‘Thakurdalan’ (An annexe or separate building used for annual festivals. They are flat-roofed buidlings called Chandi mandap or thakur dalan and are built on a north-south axis so that the images face south when they are installed) of their building complex and the artisans had to stay in the houses of Zaminders for two to three months continuously.

After the partition of Bengal in 1947, many artisans migrated from East Bengal (Now Bangladesh) to set up their studios also at Kumortuli. The potters of West Bengal and East Bengal still maintain their separate identity. The two communities of potters  even have separate umbrella organisations ‘Kumortuli Mritshilpi Sanskriti Samity’ the older one formed by the potters originally  from Krishnanagar and the ‘‘Kumortuli Mritshilpi  Samity’, a late seventies creation of the immigrants from East Bengal.

Nowadays around 200 families live here. They make clay idols for the various festivals. This potter’s town supplies images to about  more than 90 countries worldwide like England, USA, Hungery, Bulgaria, Russia, Australia, Poland etc. Most of Artisan’s surname is ‘Pal’. The most renowned among them are Ramesh Chandra Pal, Mohan Bansi Pal, Rudra Pal, Prodip Rudra Pal, Rakhal Pal, Ganesh Pal, Kartik Pal. Women artisans are also involved in idol making, like Minati Pal, Soma Pal, Kanchi Pal, Champa Rani Pal. These talented artists not only make the idol of God and Goddess, they also make statues of famous personalities  like Ramkrishna Paramhansa, Swami Vivekananda, Michael Madhusudhan Dutta, Subasha Chandra Bose, Bidhan Chandra Roy, Khan Abdul Gaffar khan etc. With the increase of  prices of raw materials, profit margins are getting narrower. It is of no wonder that the present generation  is not getting much interest in carrying forward such a less remunerative  profession. They are getting educated for better jobs.

Different Ingredients for idol of Durga:
Kumortuli is not just about idol makers of god or goddess. The goddess Ma Durga  has to be armed, dressed and decorated properly before  leaving  for the various pandals. Many families here remain busy with carving works from the pith of ‘Sola’ reed or from silver and gold foil. These are the two predominant media of decoration- the gorgeous ‘Daaker saaj’ and ‘Bangla Sajj. Daaker sajj is made by white sola and silver foil.  While sola reeds grow in ponds and marshy land and are very much indigenous, the foils earlier had to be imported from Germany. The foils used to come by mail, hence the name ‘Daaker Saaj’ (Daak means mail, and Saaj means Decoration). Decorations of idols in  ‘Bangla sajj’ made by white papers, coloured  foils and strings.  The ingredients for the Maa Durga’s  decor come from various corners of the state  and the list is long --- Sola, foil, zari, jute, clay, straw, tin, plates etc. Some articles come as raw materials, while other like her saree, weapons and matted hair or the lion’s mane and skin arrive ready for use. The hair and the mane are both jute products,  and incidentally, they are are  produced by workers belonging to the Muslims community.

Bangla-Sajj

Daaker-Sajj

How the Durga idols are made:
The entire process of making of the idols, starting from the collection of clay to ornamentation is a holy process. The first clay is brought from Prostitute quarter as it is consider to be very holy, and the rest are collected from the banks of a river, preferably the Ganges.
Idols of Maa Durga is made with a core of hay, wrapped around the kathamo with clay and it is dried in the sunlight. Finishing layers of clay are  given with hands by the artisans. Then comes the paint followed by clothes and other decorations.
And important events is ‘Chakku Daan’ (Drawing of the Eyes on the face of the idols). The eyes of idol are painted on Mahalaya (New moon proceeding Durga Puja). On the day of painting of the eyes, the artisans observe fast for the whole day and eat only vegetarian food at the end of the day.

Kumortuli as I have seen