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On Monday, April 10, the teachers and various teacher organisations of Delhi University staged a protest during an Executive Council meeting, demanding the absorption of ad-hoc and temporary teachers along with the formation of governing bodies in Delhi government-funded DU colleges.

The members of the Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) protested outside the vice chancellor’s office while the Executive Council meeting was underway. They were joined by the teachers’ wing of the Aam Adami Party, the Academics for Action and Development Delhi Teachers’ Association (AADTA). The demonstration included two members of the Executive Council itself, Seema Das and Rajpal Singh Pawar, who are also associated with AADTA. The primary issue raised was that of the displacement of ad-hoc teachers, leading to dire financial conditions and job insecurity.

“The ousting of long-serving teachers is inhumane and promotes social insecurity in the working of the ad-hoc teaching community, which is not in the interest of the academic environment, teachers, and the community.”

—AK Bhagi, Delhi University Teachers’ Association President

They demanded the absorption of displaced teachers and additionally called for the formation of governing bodies in colleges funded by the Delhi government, claiming that the “arbitrary displacements” had been a result of the absence of governing bodies.

“DU has been reneging on its promise of no displacement and warned that this is leading to the harassment of thousands of ad-hoc and temporary teachers working in the colleges of the University.”

—Seema Das, Executive Council Member and Member of AADTA

Displacement of ad-hoc teachers has been a pressing issue in the varsity, as data gathered by some University teachers suggests that nearly 76% of ad-hoc teachers have been displaced. Of the 615 ad-hoc teachers who were interviewed for permanent positions in various colleges, it is estimated that nearly 465 have been displaced as of April 8. Many of them have been teaching for several years, some even decades and nearing retirement.

“You cannot displace them in just two minutes. What will happen to them? Where will they go? Many of these teachers are above 40 and some are even nearing retirement. They provided their services despite knowing that they were not going to receive any facilities that the permanent staff do. We have been abandoned by the University and left in a lurch.”

— An anonymous ad-hoc teacher who was displaced recently

Some teachers alleged lack of transparency in the interview process, saying that they were not selected despite having experience and academic publications.

Featured Image Credits: DU Beat Archives

Sanika Singh
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Around the Campus

Pride, Privilege, Politics: A Third-Year Perspective on Being Queer in DU

By Sanika Singh April 10, 2023

As final-years gear up for farewell, here is an attempt by a first-year queer student to ask and articulate what their LGBTQ experience has looked like.

When I first took up this piece, I must admit the tinge of narcissism I brought to the table with me. As a first-year student, I wanted to look up to these seniors—these wonderful, proud, queer seniors, whose mere existence on campus had made me feel safe and like I belonged—for answers. It’s as if my long-suppressed desire of stopping every queer senior in their tracks and bombarding them with questions had finally found a less-creepy outlet. I wanted to ask them if they had felt the same way. Had they stepped into college with similar dreams and aspirations as me? Did those dreams come true? Did they feel just as lost and lonely? Was the feeling going to last forever, or was there someone to turn to? I reached out to the ever-so-loving hand of the guiding senior that DU had taught me to trust so much.

As you can imagine, my plan of mapping out a queer journey and, vicariously, a personal trajectory too, is not exactly how things panned out. Assuming the existence of a single, unified, queer DU student experience was a fallacy in the first place. Each day at DU is a lesson in the incredible diversity of this university, and its queer students are no exception. Queer people are far from a monolith, and their journeys as students at Delhi University are shaped by their wide range of backgrounds, privilege, and family values. Equally important is the college in which they land.

It is certainly true that for many, DU, or college in general, represents a highly liberating and exhilarating experience—to be away from the shackles of one’s often queerphobic and non-accepting family and to experiment, question, and live on your own terms perhaps for the first time is no small deal, after all. The question I wanted to pose, however, is how often those hopes are realised.

I did have very high hopes about Delhi and queerness but it didn’t meet my expectations. Queer people in Delhi have this very secluded, exclusive circle. The community itself has not been too welcoming. If you see a bunch of queer kids hanging out and you think that you can just go and blend in with them, you probably can’t.

Titas, a final-year student from Miranda House

This feeling of alienation, resulting from a homogenised, elitist, and exclusive queer culture, is one that I sadly found echoed by most final-year students that I talked to. Another person lamented,

Being queer is always supposed to look a certain way in DU. I, as an individual without coloured hair, multiple piercings, non-ability to party, drink alcohol, etc always feel like I don’t really belong in these circles.

An anonymous final-year queer student

Rejected from these social circles, one may turn to queer collectives and gender cells for community—or at least so I thought in my naivety. The very existence of these bodies in most DU colleges remains an exception to the rule, especially when it comes to whether or not the college administration recognizes them officially. Much to my disappointment, I was additionally disillusioned about the integrity and effectiveness of these bodies in colleges where they do exist.

Most administrations are happy to use places like the Queer Collective tokenistically to appear progressive when required, but otherwise want everyone to be hush hush about the same on most accounts. You’d expect at least DU professors to be progressive and all that? Most aren’t.

—an anonymous final-year queer student

Problems of elitism are quick to seep into queer collectives too. Their effectiveness, in that case, seems to stem from how empathetic and accepting an environment they are able to cultivate and the true sense of community they may foster.

We were able to start a queer collective in our college. It’s not a formalized society, but it does exist as a safe space for people to come and talk about things. I personally saw a lot of people journeying from what they thought was their cishet identity to their queerer identity, and that was really nice to be able to see them be open with their friends and have that safe space. So, I think in terms of the University, if we just have more places like that where people, one, have the ability to learn, and two, have this community where they can talk to people, it would be great in terms of making the University more queer-friendly.

— Sagarika, a final-year student from St. Stephen’s College

As with all things DU, politics also factors in a big way when it comes to being queer on campus. While for some, their identity becomes a political statement in itself, others prefer to distance themselves from such a stance.

The “safe” space of DU definitely comes with multiple terms and conditions. At a time when there is a humungous right-wing upsurge in the university, there is constant control of the queer folx around.

The queer community itself is largely covertly divided because not everyone has the access to the same kind of social resources and that creates the image of what queerness is acceptable and what is not. Nonetheless we have come a long way from multiple colleges to having just gender cells to now having queer collectives. It is definitely a step forward but there still stands a long way to go.

But amidst all the brouhaha I hope that people never lose sight of the fact that pride was and must always remain a protest first and a celebration later. To alienate one from the latter is a disservice to the history of this deeply political movement.

– Anwesh Banerjee, final-year student from Ramjas College

One of the loveliest anecdotes that I came across while working on this piece was one shared by a final-year student from one of DU’s women’s colleges. I must spare the details for the sake of anonymity, but they described finding, within the pages of decades-old library books, queer love letters and Urdu shayari written for and by the women students of the institution. There is solace to be found in this history of queerness at DU, but it also signals the continuing presence of queer students as part of the diversity of this campus. LGBTQ+ voices have mattered and will always continue to matter as queerness continues to shape this dynamic university space.

Featured Image Credits: Scroll.in

Sanika Singh
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Students Detained by Delhi Police after NREGA Discussions

By DU Beat March 29, 2023

Several students and activists who had assembled to discuss the ‘attack’ on NREGA were unlawfully detained by the Delhi Police.

On 24th March, a peaceful discussion organized by ‘Collective’, a youth-led political organization at Arts Faculty, Gate No 4, Delhi University, on the subject – “Cutting NREGA, silencing people, Demanding right to work”, was disrupted by Delhi Police. This was followed by detention of several students and activists involved in the discussion.

There was heavy police deployment on campus owing to prior protests by students on debarment of two students on account of BBC documentary screening. Soon after the session commenced, the police barged in and disrupted the proceedings. The speakers, which included Jean Dreze (economist from Jharkhand ), Richa Singh (NREGA union activist from UP) and Com. Somnath (Jan Sangharsh Manch Haryana) were also held at Maurice Nagar Cyber Cell till eleven in the evening.

All the protocols were followed and the concerned security authorities including the nearby police station were informed. Right before the discussion began; the police demanded a written permission from the proctor – something that has never been required previously. The SHO then necessitated that the discussion would continue only if the use of mike was discarded, the assembly conceded. But, mere minutes after the introduction, the police imposed section 144, students were removed from the spot and some were taken in police vans”

– Sourya Majumder, the joint secretary of Collective, in conversation with DU Beat.

The police allegedly questioned the validity and importance of discussions on issues like NREGA in college spaces. They demanded that such matters which have nothing to do with the student body should not fall within the ambit of discussions on campus. Sourya claims the cops were condescending to the Collective members. Videos of police brutally dragging students into vans have also been circulating social media. At the police station as well, their behaviour was antagonistic.

The police was very xenophobic in their approach during interrogation. They were very brutal with the students and the mazdoor union activists. They took our aadhar number – something which has never been done before. An international student was also detained and was heckled by the police. They tried to threaten to take his visa, deport him. Sadly there has been an unfortunate degradation in the treatment of people who are detained” – Anandita, a member of Collective.

So far no FIR has been registered in this case. People have greatly condemned this incident, pointing out that it goes on to show the criminal infringement of the democratic rights of people to assemble peacefully and discuss critical issues.

Rubani Sandhu

[email protected]

Image credit: DU Beat Archives

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AISA Organises People’s Literature Festival, Condemns DU Lit Fest as ‘BJP-RSS Propaganda’

By Sanika Singh March 18, 2023

Rejecting the alleged ‘sham of DU Literature Festival’ which was organised in Ramjas College from March 17–19, AISA organised a ‘People’s Literature Festival’ on March 17, coinciding with the former.

On March 17, the All-India Students’ Association (AISA) organised a ‘People’s Literature Festival’ at the University Arts Faculty from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The festival enjoyed the attendance of hundreds of students and prominent speakers from the fields of film, academia, and journalism.

With a slogan of celebrating ‘Krantikari’ literature in place of ‘Sarkari’ literature, the festival was organised in direct opposition to the DU Literature Festival, which was held from March 17–19, 2023, on Ramjas College grounds. The organisation alleged that the latter was hosted “with a whole range of BJP-corporate intellectuals”, who “spewed communal venom on the platform of a public university”, as accused by AISA’s press release and social media handles.

“Rather than calling for the cancellation of the Lit Fest, we wanted to bring about a positive campaign as an alternative” – Anjali, AISA DU Secretary.

Anjali further described the program as “an attempt to reclaim the democratic space of dissent in the University.”

The festival had a focus on “revolutionary traditions in literature”, hosting a range of interactive speaker sessions on the topics of resistance, cinema, media, caste, history, literature, and people’s movements. It featured a line-up of speakers such as ‘Anarkali of Aarah’ director Avinash Das, ‘Mooknayak’ editor and journalist Meena Kotwal, historian S. Irfan Habib, and professor Apoorvanand, among others.

The program also included an open mic session of poetry recitation by the University students, along with Professor Nandita Narain, who inaugurated the event with a rendering of ‘Hum Dekhenge’ by Faiz. The team of ‘Raschakra’ performed a theatrical reading of ‘Afghani Dukhtaran’, a play written by Purwa Bhardwaj and directed by Vinod Kumar, centring on the literature and resistance of the women of Afghanistan against years of oppression. The festival concluded with a cultural performance and songs of resistance.

Feature Image Credits: DU Beat

Sanika Singh
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Foreign Ties: a Conversation with an Exchange Student in DU

By DU Beat March 16, 2023

Did you know that the University of Delhi offers a Student Exchange Program? DU Beat recently got in touch with Dominik, an exchange program student from Austria who’s currently enrolled in Hindu College, University of Delhi. Read on to find out all about this program from a candid conversation with Dominik and his journey so far.

Applying to Attend Delhi University

A history student from the University of Vienna, Dominik is currently enrolled in Hindu College as an exchange program student. Talking about his experiences while applying for the program, he says,

“It was a long process. It took me six months to get everything through. It could have taken even longer if I hadn’t begun on time.” – Dominik

The University of Delhi is in a partnership with the University of Vienna under which students and professors from the two universities are given the opportunity of an exchange program, post a rigorous selection process. In stark contrast with Delhi University’s generally ignorant and secretive nature surrounding the student exchange program, Dominik talks about his home university’s efforts in helping him contact a previously unresponsive DU.

“Getting in touch with the University was the hardest part. My home university professors would constantly email on behalf of me and helped me get in touch with Delhi University. This followed extensive research on available courses and colleges.” – Dominik

A mandatory prerequisite for the program is a language proficiency test. For Dominik, he was required to submit his English language proficiency test scores. The next crucial stage involves several rounds of interview sessions with professors and exchange program officers, who evaluate the student’s overall suitability for the program. The important documents which are essential to be kept handy are a motivation letter, CV, cover letter and academic transcripts.

“It’s so hard to get anything done, get a signature or a stamp. They send you back and ask you to come back later, and there’s no actual reason for it.” – Dominik

University Culture

The conversation further delved into life at university and the cultural aspects of it. Dominik shares,

“One thing that’s great about the university culture here is that you are really close to your professors. They know your name, they really help you out, you have their phone number. This is something which is unimaginable in Austria.” – Dominik

He further emphasised on the attendance system in Austrian universities, saying,

“One thing that’s really different in Austria is that we don’t have an attendance policy, you have a choice whether to attend classes, so there’s a lot of freedom and time to pursue other things that way.” – Dominik

Academic Contrasts

The selection of your course is a crucial step involved and conducting extensive background research before applying is a good idea. Dominik shares his personal experience of going through hundreds of answers posted on websites which eventually helped him make the choices. Availability of a certain course or paper also plays an important role, since unlike Austrian universities, Delhi University has a pre-structured curriculum. Discussing academics, Dominik adds,

“In Austria, you can choose amongst various different courses and you have the option to decide which course to study in which semester. In the framework of sixteen credits, you can build your own course so to say and try out what suits you best.” – Dominik

Speaking of his experience of studying history in Delhi University, he comments,

“You can learn about colonial history from the victim’s side, and not from the oppressor’s side. You can feel the emotions still attached to this history, so it’s really interesting to learn from this perspective, and break free from the Eurocentric point of view of history.” – Dominik

Words of Advice

“Don’t give up. It’s a long process but it’s so worth it. There’ll be bureaucratic hurdles; all this hard work and problems will be forgotten and you’ll only have nice memories then.” – Dominik

Feature Image Credits: DU Beat

Sigy Ghosh

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PGDAV Evening Students Fined and Suspended for Organising a Peaceful Protest

By DU Beat March 12, 2023

PGDAV Evening students found themselves suspended indefinitely after organising a peaceful protest in their college premises. The college has also imposed a fine of Rs. 1000 on the students.

In a recent commotion about their annual cultural fest, Pravaah, to be held on 21and 22 March 2023, PGDAV Evening College relayed an indefinite suspension and a fine of Rs. 1000 on four of its students—Aman Tonger, Yash Baisoya, Tushar Dayma, and the fourth, who wishes to remain anonymous—as a consequence of a peaceful protest organised by them on 13 February 2023. According to the aggrieved students, the protest was conducted to request the college authorities permit a DJ on the college premises during their annual fest- Pravaah, but the college disagreed.

Application by the students — Image credits: Student of PGDAV Evening College

Aman Tonger, a 3rd year B.A. Program student at PGDAV (Evening), who led the protest, said in conversation with DU Beat, “We wanted a DJ at our fest, and even after submitting an application to the principal, we received no response. So, we decided to organise a small, peaceful protest to express our dissatisfaction with the same. We didn’t misbehave with any teacher or student or cause any damage to college property; it was a purely peaceful protest”. The students were soon approached by the principal and their administration and were asked to write an application with all their names, contact details, and signatures. According to Aman, the principal said, “naam likhdo, tumhaare saare kaam ho jaaenge.”

Notice of payment of fine — Image Credits: Student of PGDAV Evening College

Adding on to this, another student who found themselves suspended after this protest stated, “A few days after the protest, all four of us who signed our names on the application received an email from the college informing that we are required to be present before the Disciplinary Committee on 23 February 2023 at 4:30 PM.” The very same day, after their hearing in front of the discipline committee headed by the convenor, Dr. Hari Pratap, and the principal, Prof. R.K. Gupta, these four students received another e-mail officiating their suspension, that too, in an indefinite capacity. Alongside the suspension, the students were also liable for a fine of Rs. 1000 and were required to deposit it before 28 February 2023.

Notice to appear before disciplinary committee — Image Credits: Student of PGDAV Evening College

It has been more than a week since the notification of suspension was sent out; however, the issue remains unresolved. “They kept calling me every day until I deposited the fine. The moment I did it, they stopped calling or emailing about anything. We still have no word about what happens next,” one of the students, who wishes to remain anonymous, stated.

I had an exam during the period of my suspension, and after my exam, I needed to submit an application at the principal’s office. One of the guards helped me to the office with the application despite knowing full well it could jeopardize his job. I got to learn later, he got suspended for a week as a repercussion of letting me inside the college premises.

–Student of PGDAV Evening College

DU Beat has tried contacting the college administration multiple times, but there has been no response or comment from their end, so far.

Vidushi Sinha

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Featured Image Credits: Student of PGDAV Evening College

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Features

Of Cheap Single-Occupancy Hotels and Other Woes

By DU Beat March 9, 2023

While the tropes that define romantic media are often ridiculed, they are immensely popular and continue to persist, and the popularity of these tropes reflects our own ideals and aspirations with regards to finding love.

Enemies to lovers. Forced proximity. Fake dating. These are just some of the tropes that run abound in the romance genre. Romance has always been one of the most widely loved and popular themes in media, starting from as far back as ancient Greece. Over time, several common romance tropes have emerged which continue to be used in various forms of media. By virtue of their very nature, such tropes are huge cliches. It is widely recognised that they are unrealistic and such things rarely ever happen in real life. However, the continued popularity of these tropes in media seems to suggest that in spite of such attitudes, people still enjoy them immensely.

By definition, a trope is a frequently used plot device in media. While the term itself has come into use recently, the concept has existed for centuries. For example, forbidden love is one of the most common romance tropes which has persisted throughout centuries; there are several stories of Greek mythology which revolve around this trope. Think of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, which has inspired thousands of stories in books, movies, music and art. Other tropes like fake dating have developed more recently, but have proved to be equally popular as media involving them is voraciously consumed by people. In fact, it could be argued that the entirety of romance-themed media is now built around these different romantic tropes because that is what people wish to see.

The interesting thing about this is that these tropes are widely ridiculed by a very large section of people because they are seen as unrealistic, and because of how frequently they are used, also as boring and vapid. In spite of this, their popularity remains unchallenged, and often the very people who ridicule them are also the ones who enjoy them. The question is, what is it that makes us love these tropes? Why do we keep going back to them even when we know they are unrealistic? Most of us don’t expect to find love by being forced to share a bed with a grumpy but weirdly endearing person, but we love reading about it or watching about it anyway.

To me, it seems like the very unrealistic nature of these tropes that we make fun of is also what makes us love them. Finding love is difficult. It is unlikely that something like falling in love at first sight will ever happen in our own lives. So we read about it or watch it play out between two characters on a screen because it offers us an escape from the complications of our own real-world quests to find ‘true love’. There is comfort to be found in the predictability of these romance tropes because our own lives are fraught with uncertainty at every turn. Your academic rival will probably not end up becoming your partner, but in the romance novel you’re reading it will definitely happen.

All these romance tropes have different characteristics and often, we like them because we want to experience the same things in our own relationships. If you loved the exchange of snarky comments and sarcastic quips between Anthony Bridgerton and Kate Sharma, it is probable that you want a relationship in which you can have the same kind of banter with your partner. It is no secret that a lot of people put themselves in the shoes of the characters they are watching. In a way, consuming media with these romance tropes is a way of vicariously experiencing the different situations and emotions that arise from them.

The popularity of these tropes speaks for themselves. The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood, a variation of the enemies to lovers trope in an academic setting, sold millions of copies around the world and became a sensation on Tiktok. Titanic is one of the most popular movies in the world, and people still bawl their eyes out watching Leonardo di Caprio and Kate Winslet’s doomed relationship play out on the screen. At the end of the day, in spite of their improbability, all romance tropes carry something or the other that we can all relate to. The experiences might not be universal, but the emotions attached to them are. Romance tropes in the media will continue to persist as long as people love and wish to be loved. So while you probably shouldn’t (and don’t) expect to find love when your dupatta gets caught in a stranger’s watch, you can take comfort in the fact that the characters on your screen will, no matter what happens in your own life.

Image credit: Pinterest

Urmi Maitra

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Fearful of Failing Language Exams, First Year Students Reapply for CUET

By DU Beat March 4, 2023

Many first year DU students who opted for regional language subjects are reapplying for CUET 2023-24 because of the fear of failing their exams owing to advanced syllabus and other administrative issues.

Several first year students enrolled in BA programme degrees who opted for regional languages are now reapplying for CUET 2023-24. They are doing so out of the fear of failing their language exams, which have an unexpectedly advanced syllabus. The students believed that they would be taught the basics of the languages they had chosen. They are unaware about basics such as the alphabets of the languages, and yet are being taught complicated literature.

The University has adopted an extremely nonchalant attitude towards the concern of these students. Its response is that nothing can be done about the issue at hand. In fact, the administration holds the students responsible for not rectifying the curriculum beforehand. The demand raised by the student body to be able to change their language subjects to either Hindi or Sanskrit has repeatedly been denied.

The syllabus had to be completed in a short span, so there was absolutely no comprehensive explanation of topics and the lectures lacked any sort of discussions.”

– Aishwarya, a first year student of Gargi College in conversation with DU Beat

The students have also complained regarding the fiasco created around the eligibility criteria. In November 2022, the document issued by the university on its website did not contain the eligibility criteria. However, when inspected by PTI, an old document with an unedited eligibility criteria was visible. This further fuelled confusion among the students.

There is also a severe delay in the appointment of teachers of language subjects. A Miranda House student of BA Programme with Political Science and Tamil as her combination has revealed that she is the only student in the college with such a combination, and a teacher was appointed to her only last week. Many students are extremely dejected, and are afraid that they will fail their end-semester exams. This apprehension is leading them to consider appearing for CUET and taking admission all over again, with different choice of subjects.

Rubani Sandhu

[email protected]

Image credit: Hindustan Times

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DU to Launch 18 New Courses in Upcoming Session

By DU Beat March 2, 2023

The University of Delhi is set to introduce 18 new courses from the academic session 2023-2024, announced DU VC Yogesh Singh on Tuesday, February 28, 2023. A five-year LLB program, 8 Medical Science Programs, and B.Tech programs are the highlights of these courses.

On February 28 2023, DU Vice Chancellor Yogesh Singh, announced that DU is set to launch 18 new courses beginning from the academic year 2023-24. The new decision will create room for several new, unprecedented courses at DU, including a five-year LLB program, MBA in Business Analytics, 8 Medical Science programs, and even B.Tech programs. Other programs for both UG and PG shall also be included in these 18 courses.

Emulating the five-year course structure of the National Law Universities, the inclusion of five-year integrated programs in LLB will now allow high school graduates to directly pursue law at the UG level from Delhi University. Besides LLB, the decision to expand DU’s course catalog to also include programs in Medical Sciences and Engineering is an implementation of a part of the New Education Policy. The aim is to enhance the quality and dissolve the erstwhile distinctions between streams and pave the way for diversity in education. The varsity has also mentioned BCA LLB and B.COM LLB as prospective add-on courses to this list.

“Students who enroll in the new programs will be able to benefit immensely from the rich quality of education imparted here and the curriculum will be interdisciplinary in nature. For instance, we already have the Faculty of Management Studies, and professors from there can teach certain papers of the BBA LLB program. Similarly, (the) law (course) includes papers of political science as well. There might be five different kinds of papers and the professor with the relevant specialization can teach the course.”

– A University of Delhi official

DU Registrar Vikas Gupta has stated that the varsity administration is still deliberating upon the possible avenues to implement this efficiently. It is working on a detailed framework designed to delineate the fundamentals of the admissions process for these courses. There is still no confirmation whether the admission to these courses will also traverse the prevailing CUET method or not. “It is still under the planning stage and we are trying to launch the programs by the next academic session”, he said.

Vidushi Sinha

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My City: An Open Art Gallery

By Anwesh Banerjee October 15, 2022

The festival of Durga Puja is not just a celebration of the homecoming of the goddess but also a cultural bonhomie, celebrating art of all sorts. Read on for more.

Durga Puja or as we bengalis fondly call it pujo, is probably the greatest celebration of art Calcutta sees on an annual basis. There might be special art drives in the Lake area where people end up drawing twelve feet long alponas (the bengali version of rangoli but done with ground rice paste traditionally) and bizarrely absurd, politically provocative graffitis on walls along the Jadavpur campus and other upcoming up-market cafe areas. There is also the latest mandatory tourist spot – the Old Currency Building, now turned into a three floor specially curated celebration of the Bengal School of Art – from colonial times to independent India. But none of these sporadic clusters exemplify the community euphoria in viewing and consuming art the way pujo does.

It is a cultural whirlpool. Turn a corner and you will see an entire alley, otherwise dingily darkened – now turned bright and dreamy with a canopy of yellow fairy lights hanging overhead. A few more turns and you will see a variation of the same display of luminosity in terms of a street where the lights are now multi-coloured and are strung together vertically, on either side of the road. As you make your way through, it is not just a simple lane you are walking through any more. It is like walking into the dreamscape of your unposted letters of love, now strung together in the form of a million glistening light orbs. But the magicality of the moment I described – nowhere near the actual experience because pujo as a festival can only be felt – is exemplified further in areas with the bigger pandals and celebrations where the canopy is no longer just strings of light bound together. But an entire canopy put together in glorious designs and colours. You are no longer in a street you have traversed all year round. It is a tunnel of a fantasy land from another world, which self activates every year briefly and disappears – only to appear bigger and brighter the next year.

Who is the sculptor of this figure? Did this club change their usual guy? Is Sanantan Dinda doing Naktala this year or did Chetla Agrani buy him out? Why did they have to distort the face thus? Doesn’t she look too angry in this one?

A cacophony of voices asking the same questions together. Having spent so many years in the city and vehemently holding my ground before parents who would have much preferred to go on a holiday – far removed from the nauseating sweat and crowd infestations of the festival – I like many others have become quite familiar with the varied sculptural styles we see our idols built in. Kumortuli or the Potter’s Colony is the stuff of absolute photo stories across the world.

But the potters or sculptors as I prefer calling them, who spend their many years under makeshift shacks in the midst of floodwater and mud, have their own distinctive styles and contributions to the evolution of the festival as a whole. The traditional yellow face of the goddess with long draw, darkly lined eyes is still to be seen in many places, but in the larger discourse of the creation of idols, it has give way to the more humanist thickly eyelash-ed faces of the Rudra Pal brothers – who now are at the receiving end of commissions from the biggest clubs in the city.

Thousands of people flock every year to see these idols, which although unchanged in their style have served to give vision to the popular imagination of what the goddess looks like. Their figures are adorned in the traditional golden foil called the daaker shaaj or the ornament that came by post (the foil used to be imported from Germany at one point) or the pristine white of the sholaar shaaj or the ornamentation made from thermocol. Art historians will never consider this but the potters of Calcutta are the true holders of the legacy of Ravi Varma, the first Indian to give face to our gods. But even beyond these traditional portrayals there are daring artists like Bhashkar Sur and Sanatan Dinda, all exemplary modern artists in their own right who come up with visualisations of the goddess figure in accordance with the theme of the club they are hired by that year.

Which brings me to the next big thing about pujo in my city – the theme. Much before people even start their shopping for the festival, posters and advertisements proudly announcing the themes for each individual club go around the city. People sitting huddled in autos are found discussing-

Did you hear Chetla Agrani is going to be doing something based on Kalidasa? But I really liked what Bosepukur did last year- though I am not sure if I completely understood it – did you? I do not know about the rest but I am most definitely going to go to Sreebhumi first – haven’t you heard they are doing Burj Khalifa this year?

I have been to galleries and seen art installations and then I have attended Durga Pujo in my city. If cities could be works of art then the thousand and more pujos spread across the length and breadth of the city are the many brush strokes and colour splashes on its expanding canvas. I have seen, within two months or sometimes three, artists and workers make an entire temple structure out of steel utensils. Award winning clubs which have conjured simply out of nowhere temple structures out of – wait for it- knit grass blades. But this is not just a celebration of empty art. This art is deeply political too. Many high concept pujos find people crowding the exit area poring over long standees explaining the concept of the theme and the decoration people just saw. For there are clubs standing in solidarity with the farmer’s protest – with massive installations of feet joined together and the blisters resembling melting faces of the heroes we will never know. Some turn an entire lane into a brothel with extra figures of women waiting for customers and finally leading upto the room of the brothel madame who sits there protecting them all – envisioned in the form of the goddess. But sometimes in the hands of a different artist, she takes the shape of a migrant woman – carrying her four children sitting on the back of a truck, her third eye glaring at you in the face.

During Durga Pujo, my city is an open art gallery with its people turning from one lane to another partaking in and bringing to life the glorious art on display.

Anwesh Banerjee
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