Subrata Mukhopadhyay

Santanu Saraswati

“When autumn used to arrive with unsteady steps, I ran over a lush green carpet of soft grass, following the butterflies, dancing from one blossom to another. I still remember how I used to chase after their colourful and vibrant wings. Memories of walking into the zamindar’s mansion, holding on to my mother’s sari was like the standing on the threshold of a new dream, that surrounded me like an aura throughout those five days”.


Life has changed a lot since then, but some memories of Burdwan’s Nadonghat village still takes the former city Mayor, Subrata Mukhopadhyay, to a land of fairy tales where Goddess Durga move on a “King of Africa” and kills the demon with her ten hands.

Third son of a schoolteacher of a remote village of Nadonghat, Subrata’s puja used to start with the day the clay modeler’s annual visit to his village from the city.” I along with my friends used to forget our meal seeing him slapping the very first layers of clay on the straw and bamboo structure of the idol inside a makeshift camp in the backyards of the jaminder’s house. The essence of the wet earth and the beauties of the cerulean autumn sky used to attract more than my schoolbooks. Apart from these I used to love having kuler achhar and phuchkas along with my friends during those days in Nadonghat.”

Playing firecrackers during Dewali was prohibited in Nadonghat village. “So we used to fulfill our wishes of playing firecrackers during Durga puja. My father used to buy bag-full of firecrackers for us and we played with it all night long especially on Dashami.”

Subrata’s family shifted to Saringabad village near Budge Budge when he was just a Class-III student. “We were a joint family at Saringabad. We had our own family puja there. My grandfather hired clay modelers from Kolkata’s Potuapara. These clay modelers used to start making the idols one month before the puja. We didn’t have electricity then. So the clay modelers had to work only during the day. And for watching them working all of our brothers and sisters used to stop going to school.”

“Really, those were the days! I was little clever among them. I never used to express my wishes to my mother. I used to run to my grandmother, sit on her lap, kiss her and then say,’ O grandma, I would just love to watch these clay modelers making idols rather than going to school now’. My grandma used to shake her head and smile. And my mother used to shout saying, ‘ you are too, clever. You will fail this year. Even your father will fail to make you pass this year.”

Subrata started living in Kolkata in 1965 as a student. “I lived in the Harindge Hostel for few months then shifted to Mahajaati Sadan. The union irrigation minister, Priyaranjan Das Munshi was my roommate during my days in Central Kolkata mess. Life started changing since then and I couldn’t recount when I fall in love with the city puja.”

Pandal hopping with Priyada was my regular routine during the festival days. Priyada was a very good organiser and an exceptional orator. Organisers used to hire us for making announcements during the puja days. “One day we became member of College Street Baroari Puja Samity and that was the beginning of getting myself associated with Kolkata puja organisation. Starting from collecting subscriptions to managing the sindoor festival or bringing out procession for immersion—I got associated with everything.”

At about 12 am the former mayor and the present union irrigation minister used to start pandal hopping on a hired car. “People used to call us Jagai-Madhai. And we never took anybody else in our ode to puja pandals during those days. Sometimes Priyada wished to pick up one more from our organizing committee, but I was always against it since pandal hopping with Priyada was simply exhilarating and I was never in favour of sharing it with others. ”

It was in 1970 when Subrata shifted to Ekdalia Road apartment in Ballygunj. Since then Ekdalia Evergreen became synonymous with Subrata Mukhopadhyay. “ This year it will be my 35th year with Ekdalia Evergreen. But still I do believe that organizing North Kolkata puja was much easier for us than being the chief patron of Ekdalia Evergreen. Though this is ‘my’ puja, but yet I do admit that there is a complete different flavour in North Kolkata pujas. People in northern fringes of the city get associated with the para-puja with their heart. But in South, people work with head not with heart. The puja culture in South Kolkata is too different from the North. And as I miss my childhood days in Nadanghat, so do I miss my days with Priyada organizing Durga Puja for College Street Baroari Puja Samity.”

The former city mayor never miss Kolkata during puja days except two-three occasions when he had to fly abroad for attending the International Labour Organisation’s meet as a representative of the INTUC. “Even at this age, I love to spend my puja days in Kolkata. Apart from the job of inaugurating few para-pujas, I love seeing people hopping pandal to pandal—few with their new found lovers, few with their families and few in search of somebody for their life—a complete new experience for me everyday, every year. And at night when I peep through my window pane, all I could see is only an ocean of crazy human beings moving towards the pandal, slowly, but without any sign of tiredness.”

During his days as the city mayor, Subrata’s days was very hectic. His puja used to start two-months before the original puja. “I wanted to associate the Kolkata Municipal Corporation with the greatest festival of Bengal. For the last five years we honoured the puja-organizing committees with ‘Sharad Samman’. I started this award for two reasons. First, I think that the corporation should honour the hard toil the organisers used to put in to make the para-pujas a successful one. And secondly, getting associated with Durga puja would give a facelift of KMC’s image among the Kolkatans. If KMC is part of Kolkatans’ everyday life why not it honour the efforts of its own people who make Kolkata’s puja famous in the world?”

Subrata was skeptical thinking that perhaps the change of guards at KMC might mean end of “Sharad Samman” this year. “ I am no Communist. I believe in God and I still start my day after offering a prayer to Mother Goddess. We may live in a patriarchal society but Mother is always the source of life…”

The former city Mayor loves to spend puja days as a traditional Bengali who loves the essence of new clothes, the boils of new chappals, enjoying ghugnis and phuchkas from roadside stalls and chat incessantly with friends on apple to astronauts or Mohan Bagan to Saurav Ganguly. “I still offer anjalis on Astami-puja and chant hymns with the priest empty stomach. I still believe we get all our courage through these Sanskrit slokas.”

This year too, there will be no change in routine for Subrata Mukhopadhyay. And like every year Subrata would spend the Astami in Saringabad village along with his mother and family just to plunge down the memory lane. “Sara Bacharey ei ekta din aami aamar shaishabey phirey jai…. sei gram…. sei puja…dhak, sandhi pujoy dhunuchi nachh.patka phatano aaro onek…onek kichu...It gives back my childhood days at Nadonghat where a little child used to run after the colourful butterflies…stomping the green fields…or in the land of fairies and the stories of how Goddess Durga came down to earth to save the mankind from the hands of Demons—the memories I love to beacon.” EOM.
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