[abhi1975]

Durga Puja, though is about worshiping goddess Durga nowadays it has become the biggest festival of Bengalis. The whole West Bengal as well as some other states also now wait eagerly for this festival to come. Pandals (Temporary erected place for the deity), Devi Durga with her children, Lights, beat of Dhaks (Musical Instrument), new clothes, what not. Ok enough, for the rest try google, yahoo, wiki, etc.

This year I have tried to learn how to take pictures with a P&S digital camera during the festive days and what will follow is the result of my efforts. Now I'm just posting the pics, later I will try to add some captions with the pics.

Sovabazar Rajbari













Another old traditional Puja





Lets get out on the streets, shall we??















This is made with Aluminium wires



Inside wall of a Pandal





And the pandal from outside

[abhi1975]

A famous Puja in Salt Lake. This kind of setup requires atleast 6 months hard work.

[abhi1975]

This inside a Hindu place of worship





The Puja in my locality

[abhi1975]

This one I liked most

















Puja at Park Circus Maidan

















This one is based on SINGUR theme

[abhi1975]

Puja at College Square





How I wish I have this in my home









Puja at BagBazar











One day, on Navami I have decided to venture out in the suburbs and capture some very old (Continued for the last 300-500 years) Pujas

This one is enroute, at Burdwan





I reached Kalna around noon, from here my trip was scheduled to commence, but before that very surprisingly I came across this 108 Shiva Temple, a site protected by Archeological Survey of India, I was simply delighted as I had no prior info on this





But as luck would have it, here my office caught me on my cell, informed me about the mayhem at Stock Market and unfortunately I had to drop my plan and hurry back to my office. Before leaving I caught some more pictures of some surrounding temples very hastily. I will surely go back with lots of time in hand





The TerraCotta jobs on the temples were awesome









Ok, I am done. Now you can abuse me as much as you want for bothering you all with the cruelty of the pictures, I just tried to learn and shared with you all.

[Yogesh Sarkar]

Abhi beautiful photographs, the last time I saw Puja in Kolkata was over a decade ago and I only have some recollections of it but I do remember having a lot of fun. I guess I better visit Kolkata again in the Puja days.

One suggestion, in a few photograph, the image is some what overexposed, in those circumstances use the exposure compensation option and bring it down a bit, it should help.

[hiambuj]

Photographer in Making ... hmmm.... Very nice pictures Abhi...

[suman]

Excellent efforts Abhi, got me quite nostalgic - we hardly see a handful here in Delhi. Was remembering the good old days & all the fun at Jodhpur Park, Ekdalia Evergreen, Maddox Square, Samaj Sebhi & Ballygunge Cultural - the women decked in all their finery & absolute chaos on the roads. Ashtami used to be the worst (or should that be the best LOL)

[anupmathur]

...
...
Ok, I am done. Now you can abuse me as much as you want for bothering you all with the cruelty of the pictures, I just tried to learn and shared with you all.

OK, I choose NOT to abuse you! Instead, I'll say THANKS!
Thanks for sharing such a spectrum of Puja Pandals from across the city!
Have never seen a collection like this on any other forum!

I particularly liked the 'last minute' innovation done on the Singur theme pandal!!

[abhi1975]

I am glad that you guys liked it

@ Yogesh

I picked up Kodak C713 a couple months back as my first ever digital camera, I just wanted to have a 7 MP camera and shoot for some days and see how it goes before getting a good camera. Maybe a better camera would be able to capture the scenes better and definitely I need lot more time to learn.

@ Amit

Thank you. Remember I told you about Puja days in Kolkata. I wish you guys visit Kolkata during Puja time, it's something that you should do atleast once in your lifetime.

@ Suman

I don't know when were you last in Kolkata during Pujas, nowadays the scenes are utter chaos. Almost all the big pujas including those you have mentioned requires standing in the queue for 1-2 hours, sometimes even more. I just captured those where I did not have to stand in queue I had a plan to go out early morning on Dashami to capture those Pujas but after the mayhem on Navami I simply slept till noon on Dashami, did not go out at all.

@ Anup-ji

I had plans to make this collection much more larger, meaning more tortures you see but unfortunately could not do so, hope to do much better in next puja