Photo Story - A Visit to the idol making factory in eastern India

Durga Puja is a famous festival celebrated in Kolkata every year. Durga Puja festival marks the battle of goddess Durga with the shape-shifting, deceptive and powerful buffalo demon Mahishasura, and her emerging victorious.Thus, the festival epitomises the victory of Good over Evil, but it also is in part a harvest festival that marks goddess as the motherly power behind all of life and creation.

Kumortuli , is a traditional potters’ quarter in northern Kolkata (India), the capital of the east Indian state of West Bengal. The city is famous as a sculpting hot-spot which not only manufactures clay idols for various festivals but also regularly exports them.

The potters of Kumortuli, who fashioned the clay from the river beside their home into pots to be sold at Sutanuti Bazar, managed to survive in the area. Gradually they took to making the images of gods and goddesses, worshipped in large numbers in the mansions all around and later at community pujas in the city and beyond.

My friend Sanjay and myself visited this famous place a few years ago to see the process of how the idols are handcrafted here.

Below are the photos I took at Kumortuli. Hope you enjoy them.

First phase of Lord Durga's idol completed.

The 4th generation artist who earns a living by handcrafting these idols all through the year

An almost completed idol of lord Ganesha

My friend Sanjay giving a completed idol, a stare!

Miniature idols being made for the Durga Puja

Another idol almost completed

Durga idol ready for paint

An almost complete Ganesha idols waiting for the hand to be moulded!

The clay base is combined with straw, kneaded then molded into cast made from bamboo. This is set like any clay pot, layered to a final shape, cleaned, and polished when ready. A layer of vegetable fiber called jute, mixed in with clay, is attached to the top to prevent the statue from cracking in the months ahead. The heads of the statues are more complex, and usually cast separately. The limbs of the statues are mostly shaped from bundles of straws.

On the last day of the Durga Puja, the idols are taken to a nearby river with gala and are immersed there.