Immersed In Puja Fervour, Tradition Takes Detour

Idols Head To Artificial Ponds Instead Of Ghats, But No Cutback In Enthusiasm

- Sidhartha Roy

For more than a century, Kashmere Gate's Delhi Durga Puja Samiti has carried the idol of Goddess Durga on a bullock cart to the Yamuna for immersion. Consigning the idol to the river is now prohibited, but the samiti will continue with the tradition, though the immersion will be in an artificial pond, like many other puja committees will do.

Som Prakash Mitra, member of the 113-year-old Kashmere Gate committee, said that a bullock cart would take the idol to the nearest point to the ghat from where a tractor would take over and transport it to an artificial pond in north Delhi's Burari. Deepak Bhowmick, general secretary, Karol Bagh Durga Puja Committee, however, felt the ponds created in Burari, with their knee-deep water, wouldn't do. "It is cruel to immerse the goddess' idol like that," he said, "so we have bought two tanks for water."