Post-Covid comeback for Ganesh Puja after 2-year lull in Kolkata

KOLKATA: The Lord of Wealth is back in business. The Ganpati festival in Kolkata which was hit by Covid the most, is now making a smart recovery. The number of large community Ganesh pujas that require additional electricity load had declined from 140 in 2019 to just 12 in 2020 before climbing to a modest 58 pujas in 2021.
This year, the count has swung back to above the 100-mark with 117 puja organisers applying for load.“The number is expected to go up further as many organisers apply for load even on the morning of the puja,” a CESC official said.
In addition to these, there are hundreds of Ganesh pujas organised by apartments and clubs where the power required is drawn from an existing meter.
In terms of numbers as well as load, Ganesh Puja has yet again overtaken Jagaddhatri puja in the CESC supply area that includes both Kolkata and Bhadreswar in Hooghly where Jagaddhatri puja is quite popular. In fact, Ganesh Puja has upstaged Saraswati Puja and Lakshmi Puja, in terms of catching eyeballs and power consumption, though not in numbers.
In the past couple of years when Ganesh Puja numbers had dwindled, Jagaddhatri Puja had regained the third spot after Durga and Kali Puja. But, with Ganesh Puja making a strong comeback this year, it has again reclaimed the podium position. However, as Ganesh Puja is still a one-day festival in the city, the demand for power is lower than Durga Puja. The explosion in Ganesh Puja happened around 2016 and has grown steadily since. With the Covid break now over, the power utility says they expect the numbers to cross the 2019 count next year.
“In 2019, 140 organisers had applied for a combined load of 602kw. In 2020, with the count down to 12, the load had fallen to just 35kw. In 2021 when we received 58 applications, the load increased to 202kw. This year, we have received a load requirement of 462kw till now. As applications go up, so will the load,” the CESC official said.
A puja organised by Baghbazar traders in north Kolkata has applied for the highest load of 18kw, followed by 12kw each by Sri Siddhi Vinayak Sangha in central Kolkata’s Syed Sally Lane and a puja in Madan Dutta Lane too in central Kolkata.
“Around 50% of the applicants are from north Kolkata, 25% from south Kolkata and the rest split among west, east and central Kolkata,” the power utility official added.
Idol artisans at Kumartuli have also witnessed a surge in orders after two bad years owing to the pandemic. Artisans say, with the festival making a comeback, they look forward to a prolonged season of festivals and orders that could help them turn around from the losses they had incurred in the past two years.