Sinchita Parbat

Sharmila Joshi

Text Editor

large_18_Journey_through_Kumartuli_Sinchita_MajiIMG_0016.jpg

medium_18_Journey_through_Kumartuli_Sinchita_MajiIMG_0016.jpg

small_18_Journey_through_Kumartuli_Sinchita_MajiIMG_0016.jpg

thumbnail_18_Journey_through_Kumartuli_Sinchita_MajiIMG_0016.jpg

18_Journey_through_Kumartuli_Sinchita_MajiIMG_0016.jpg

In the narrow lanes of Kumartuli in north Kolkata, barely wide
enough for a hand-pulled rickshaw to pass though, the only people you will usually
meet are the Kumars – the idol-makers of the city. It is from here that idols
of Goddess Durga and other deities make their way into Kolkata every year.
 Karthik Paul has a workshop here, a shed really of bamboo and plastic sheets, called &#39;Brajeshwar and Sons&#39; (named after his father). He tells us about the long and layered process of making an idol. Various mixes of soil like Gangamati (mud from the banks of the river) and path mati (a mixture of jute particles and Ganga mati ) are used during the different stages of making an idol.

As we talk, Paul is moulding the face of Lord Kartik with wet clay and detailing it with his expert hands. He uses a paint brush and chiyari, a hand-polished sculpting tool made from bamboo. At another workshop nearby, Gopal Paul has prepared a glue to stick a fine towel-like material onto the clay structure, to give it a skin-textured finish. Gopal is from Krishnanagar of Nadia district, around 120 kilometres north of Kolkata. Many of the workers here – all men – are from the same district; most of them stay in quarters in the same area provided by the workshop owners . The workers are hired months before the peak season. They work in eight-hour shifts, but just before the autumn festival these artisans work through the night and get paid for the overtime.The first potters in Kumartuli migrated from Krishnanagar some 300 years ago. They stayed in the then newly-forming Kumartuli for a few months, close to Bagbazar ghat , so that clay from the river could be procured easily. And they worked in the homes of zamindars, making the idols at the thakurdalans (demarcated areas for religious festivals inside the zamindars ’ residential premises) for weeks before the Durga Puja festival.

Before and during the partition of Bengal in 1905, highly skilled artisans from Bangladesh – from Dhaka, Birkampur, Faridpur – made their way to Kumartuli. With the decline of the zamindari system after India’s Independence, thesarbojonin or community puja became popular. This is when Maa Durga shifted out of the cramped thakurdalans to the wide pandals on the roads, with elaborate and separate backdrops for the goddess and other idols.Durga Puja is the biggest festival in West Bengal. It starts with Mahalaya, usually in late September- early October. On this day, thousands offer prayers to their ancestors at the banks of the Ganga (locally, the Hooghly) in a ritual called tarpan . The inauguration of the idol takes place on the days of Choturthi, Panchami or Shasthi. The main puja goes on for three days – Maha-saptami, Maha-astami, Maha-nabami. The puja rituals are long and detailed. After the three days, on Dashami (the last day), many in Kolkata offer an emotional farewell to the goddess by immersing the idols at Babughat and other spots on the Hooghly.At his workshop in Kumartuli, still giving the finishing touches to an idol, Karthik tells us that he and his workers make the colours themselves. They mix khori mati (a special clay prepared from sea froth) with colouring chemicals and a glue prepared from khai-bichi or tamarind seeds. Tamarind seed powder helps to keep the colour on clay models for a longer period of time. After a while, the idols are ready, all decked up to start their outward journeys into the city. The dimly-lit studios of Kumartuli will soon say goodbye to their works of art, which will find newer homes in the brightly-illuminatedpandals in Kolkata.

View: &#39;Journey through Kumartuli&#39;  <a href="https://ruralindiaonline.org/albums/journey-through-kumartuli">Photo album</a>This video and story were done as part of Sinchita Maji&#39;s 2015-16 PARI fellowship.

Journey through Kumartuli

కుమార్‌టులి గుండా ప్రయాణం

कुमारटुलि मं माटी के मूर्ति मन मं अइसने भरथे परान

কুমারটুলির অলিগলিতে

કુમોરટુલીના કલાકારો

കുമോർതുലിയിലൂടെ ഒരു യാത്ര

कुमारटुलि के सफर

ਕੁਮੌਰਟੁਲੀ ਵਿੱਚੋਂ ਲੰਘਦਿਆਂ

ಕುಮೋರ್ತುಲಿಗೊಂದು ಪಯಣ

कुमारटुलि की गलियां, कुम्हारों की मूर्तियां

குமார்துலியின் வழியே ஒரு பயணம்

कुमारतुलीचा फेरफटका

ଯାତ୍ରାପଥରେ କୁମାରତୁଲି

কুমাৰতুলিৰ এপাক

کُمارٹُلی کی گلیاں، کمہاروں کی مورتیاں

Kumartuli

At present, we can only accept donations in Indian rupees by Indian citizens. All donations made to the CounterMedia Trust are eligible for exemption under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act, 1961. Here is a copy of our exemption certificate.


India is bigger than New Delhi. And people need to know more about the rest of this vast nation.


Younger, media-saturated generations are growing up knowing little about their country, but a lot about the elites of a few metros and towns. For a narrowly-owned, commercially-driven media, the dumbing down of a nation is part of standard operating procedure. The last available data of the Centre for Media Studies (CMS, Delhi) show us that reports from New Delhi account for 66 per cent of news on the front pages of major dailies. The CMS data also found that just about 0.24 per cent of front page news came out of rural India. The TV channels are not much better.PARI exists to change that.We are a non-profit organisation. We publish under creative commons, and do not charge readers a subscription fee or put-up advertisements. Nothing is behind a paywall and we are completely free-to-access by anyone. We guard our independence and receive no direct grants from governments and corporations, nor any funding that could dictate our content. So, we are dependent on volunteer labour, donations from individuals, foundations and institutions that see value in independent and free media.PARI is changing the way Indian journalism reports and documents the rural.India is more than the elite of a few metros and towns. We report on rural lives and livelihoods, languages, communities, migrants and more. We need your help to pull off this most ambitious of Indian journalistic endeavours. The scale of this effort costs money. Donate generously - and spread the word about PARI.&nbsp;

Donate FAQs


Let’s get you acquainted

Welcome to PARI

All our content is, and will forever be free to consume. If you enjoy our work, you can support us by becoming a volunteer or by donating to help fund our work.

Want to republish this article? Please write to <a href="mailto:zahra@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">zahra@ruralindiaonline.org</a> with a cc to <a href="mailto:namita@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">namita@ruralindiaonline.org</a>

Journey through Kumartuli

At the centuries-old potters' colony in Kolkata, artisans work through the night on the clay idols that they will soon send out to the city for Durga Puja

Related stories

A rain-scented walk in Sivagangai

Living on ravaged land

Biswas and the bamboos on his bike

Recycling energy, Godda style

Bhadels of Goa

Pookadai: still throbbing with morning life

Koli Kadlas

Malnourishment high among children of migrants: study

Wheels of the rural Indian West

Living Under a Red Cloud in Bellary

Vedla – earrings of the Maher community

Dreaming of water, drowning in debt

Kali: the dancer and his dreams

Farmer's diet worse than a convict's

In Yavatmal, life goes on

Suicides are about the living, not the dead

Death of a carpenter

Hoisa Shigmo!

Women farmers: weaving a life in Anantapur

Defiant in Dhinkia

Spice and all that's nice

Kerala's Green Army

The ‘jugaad’ not-a-mobile

Health as someone else's wealth

Calibrating in a Kudumbashree assembly unit