Years ago, when Sukanya Banerjee was studying in a hostel in Hyderabad, the Delhi-based classical musician recalls how all the Bengalis in the campus had congregated at one place at 4 am to listen to the Mahishasuramarddini on the radio on the day of Mahalaya. “The Bengalis in our campus were from all across the country and not just from Kolkata. This is part of our DNA. The first few lines and we were all locked in,” she recalls with a smile.
Banerjee, here, was referring to the popular Bengali radio programme which began broadcasting on All India Radio in West Bengal in 1931 and later spread to many other stations of AIR. Narrated and made popular in the voice of Birendra Krishna Bhadra, the programme is aired at 4 am on the first day of the Durga Puja, also known as Mahalaya, and contains scriptural verses, devotional songs, classical music and drama. For many Bengalis who have grown up listening to Mahishasuramarddini over the years, Durga Puja is incomplete without listening to this programme.
One of the most popular festivals in India, the ten-day Durga Puja celebrates the victory of Goddess Durga over the shape-shifting demon Mahishasura. It also marks Ma Durga’s visit to her natal home with her children and many Hindus in the Eastern states of West Bengal, Tripura, Bihar, Jharkhand, Assam, Odisha and Bangladesh bring Ma Durga home in the form of idols or welcome them to big public pandals that spring up during the ten days. On the tenth day, the idols are submerged in a river but not before the cities witness rituals, pujas and festivities. The music that one gets to hear before and during the Durga Puja festivities has many layers and ranges from the traditional dhak to contemporary pujo releases, theme music and more. The Mahishasuramarddini is just one of the many ways in which Bengalis celebrate their Goddess Durga and her benevolence.
To the beat of the dhak
Each year, just around the time of Durga Puja which also coincides with Navratri and Dusshera, there are a number of Pujo releases by singers and composers. They may or may not be about the Goddess herself, but they do bring in a flavour of festivities to the celebrations. However, traditionally, it has always been the rhythmic beating of the traditional drums, known as dhak, that have heralded the oncoming of the Durga Puja festival. Says tabla exponent Pt Subhen Chatterjee, “There is nothing called Durga Puja music. The dhak itself is the music.” Keeping the beat along with the dhak are kansar (cymbals), which Chatterjee admits he was really fond of playing as a child.
The dhak, he explains further, have different rhythm patterns for different times of the day as well as for different rituals. “There is a different pattern of drumming when you wake up in the morning, a different pattern when you offer Anjali to the Ma and a different pattern while offering bhog. When the Goddess is being immersed in the water after ten days, the pattern is almost melancholic because we are bidding adieu to our Ma who was with us all these days. Even at this age, I feel teary-eyed when Ma is leaving us. Only we know how it feels when the dhak starts playing when we are saying farewell to her, knowing that we have to wait another year for her,” says the 62-year-old musician.
The relevance of Pujo releases
Imagine an Eid without a Salman Khan film release. It would surely seem like something is amiss. In a similar way, during Durga Puja, a Pujo release is seen as a significant cultural highlight. From books to films to music, this is the time to come out with such launches as people are in a festive mood and in a mood to be entertained. Growing up in the ‘80s, tabla player Tanmoy Bose recalls listening to puja releases by singers such as Manna De, Kishor Kumar and Hemanta Mukherjee among others “All these artists would release Pujo songs and it was a very big thing back then,” he says.
Kolkata-based singer-songwriter and composer Anupam Roy’s career started with the soundtrack of the Bengali film Autograph, which is considered a Pujo release since it released during Durga Puja season. The music composer of the Hindi film Piku’s soulful soundtrack shares that unlike today when artistes release songs through the year, many singers used to wait for the Pujo season to release their music. “While that culture still prevails, it has been flooded with too much music throughout the year,” he opines.
Singer Monali Thakur’s Dugga Elo became a huge hit when it was released in 2019, but Banerjee says she has been seeing it quite a lot again in recent times on reels as is the case with Sunidhi Chauhan’s Dugga Dugga. Delving further into the music releases during Pujo, Banerjee says that there are a couple of levels to it. First is the list of chart-toppers, which decide what the vibe of the Pujo that year will be like. The second layer comes with Agomoni songs, or melodies which herald the Goddess’ arrival which are sung until the fifth or sixth day of the Durga Puja. The music around Mahalaya – whether traditional or contemporary, she shares, is dedicatedly about Durga. “One of the stark differences which one finds these days in pandals in Kolkata and ones outside of the city, is that in Kolkata, the pandals have become a spectacle of their own, but if you look at the traditional format of what Pujo used to be earlier, and which has been retained in that same format in places outside of Kolkata, is that each evening starting from the Panchami till Navami, there are cultural programs with Bengali songs, dance and theatre. These are big budget live programmes. In fact, many Bengali artistes particularly from Kolkata are out of the city during Durga Puja,” she says. Roy adds to that information by stating that in America itself, there are around 64 to 68 Durga Pujas. “At least 30-40 per cent of musicians have flown to the US to perform, but this is celebration music and not necessarily music about Goddess Durga,” he points out.
Emergence of theme music
In the past 20-25 years, one of the trends which has emerged in Kolkata, which are a departure from traditional pandals, are the theme pujas. The pandals or the temporary structures housing the Durga idols have certain themes each year – ranging from mythological to contemporary and everything from the décor to the music, is according to the chosen theme of the year. Pt Chatterjee, who has been composing theme music for pandals for many years now, reveals that a lot of research and reading goes behind composing the theme music which lasts about three to four minutes and is played on loop at the pandals. This year, he has composed music for 12 puja pandals. Citing one instance, he shares that one of the puja themes this year is the divinity of the Goddess and her third eye. “I had to delve deep into the trinayana system to understand its essence and then score the music,” he says.
Ten ultimate songs for Durga Puja
- Elo Je Maa – Shreya Ghoshal
- Dugga Elo – Monali Thakur
- Ogo Amar Agamani – Sipra Das
- Amar Dugga Eseche – Akriti Kakar and Darshana Banik
- Dhaker Take Komor Dole – Abhijeet Bhattacharya
- Bolo Dugga Maiki – Arijit Singh
- Dhaak Baja Kashor Baja – Shreya Ghoshal
- Joy Maa Durga – Bappi Lahiri
- O Thakur – Upal Sengupta, Prashmita Paul, Anindya Chatterjee
- Ya Chandi – Pankaj Mullick