The ministry wanted to pitch it as ‘The Durga Puja of India’: Tapati Guha Thakurta

The festive season kicked off earlier than expected in the City of Joy as Kolkata’s Durga Puja was officially recognised by UNESCO, which inscribed Bengal’s biggest festival on its

Representative List

of the

Intangible Cultural Heritage

of Humanity on December 15. But not many would know that it took almost two decades of research for this feat to be achieved. Historian

Tapati Guha Thakurta

, the former director and honorary professor of the Center for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, spearheaded the research that has been instrumental in helping Kolkata add another feather to its cap. CT caught up with the academician, who helped Durga Puja create its space on the global map just out of her sheer passion and love for the Bengali festival and culture. Excerpts:

Post the December 15 announcement, you have become the most sought after person among the community of Durga Puja lovers and organisers. Give us a peek into your almost two-decades-long journey towards getting thiscoveted title for Kolkata Durga Puja.
My research on Durga Puja started out of passion. The work on the dossier for UNESCO started in September 2018, but I began my research in 2002 with a few colleagues including the late sociologist Anjan Ghosh. In those days, our prime source material came from the Puja organisers and artists. Year after year, we went to the pandals to talk to the various stakeholders. Since we were not media persons, many refused to even speak to us. I don’t blame them for not understanding my work. However, we received immense help from artists like

Sanatan Dinda

and Bhabotosh Sutar.

Being an art historian, why did you choose Puja as a subject?I spent my childhood in several Kolkata households. In the ’60s and ’70s, those paras didn’t have a single Puja. So, in the mid-’70s, when I took admission in Presidency College, I started exploring the festival with my friends. Gradually, I started finding interest in multiple aspects of it, such as logistics, the new art culture, how a familiar place becomes unfamiliar, how Puja reconstitutes neighbourhoods and encourages community involvement. I realised it was much bigger than a religious festival and that prompted me to start our research on how Puja was becoming a platform for a new kind of art activity. After more than 12 years of research, we came up with a book in 2015.

So, how did the UNESCO project happen?In 2012, the first application on Durga Puja was sent to UNESCO, but it was rejected. In August 2018, after going through our book, the Ministry of Culture – where I was involved in a different project – directly approached me (for the UNESCO project). They wanted me to prepare a dossier in seven months. Initially, I was not sure whether to accept it because I had already taken up a teaching assignment abroad. My husband, historian Hari Shankar Vasudevan, who I lost to COVID in 2020, encouraged me a lot. Two of my students – Sandipan Mitra and Devi Chakraborty – wanted to join me in the research. I then set up a team and we started working on the project.

How does a festival get a

heritage

tag by UNESCO?First, a country has to send an application to UNESCO. It has four parts – an elaborate form, which covers various aspects of the festival, a selection of 10 photographs, a short film on the festival and endorsement letters from the Puja stakeholders. There is a stiff competition among countries to win this recognition. We were involved in research and preparing documents. Pitching is more important than the content and the details. In the UNESCO circuit, dossier making is a separate occupation, As an academic, without any professional expertise in heritage advocacy, I came into the project quite unexpectedly. UNESCO looks into almost all the aspects – arts, community involvement, livelihood of the creative community, effects of over-commercialisation and environment. Now when I think back, it feels like our team pulled off the job and succeeded by fluke (laughs).


That sounds quite challenging. Tell us more.We got the project through Sangeet Natak Akademi under the Ministry of Culture. Initially, the ministry wanted to portray Durga Puja as a religious festival, but we told them it was much more than that. We had to write and rewrite the form, select photographs and make the film on a tight budget. In January 2019, the ministry asked us to gather close to 100 endorsement letters from the stakeholders to strengthen the application, and we managed that too. In the final phase, I even sat with the filmmaker, Nilanjan Bhattacharya, in a small studio and worked with him on the film subtitles. Then, after completing the project in March 2019, I didn’t hear from the ministry till July 2020, when they asked for a few changes in the film. Finally, in November 2021, we were asked to answer queries raised by UNESCO. After four days of the big announcement, I still haven’t heard from the ministry or received a courtesy mail of thanks.

Where did you first hear the news on December 15?First, from a north Kolkata puja and then a journalist called and confirmed the news.

Why was it pitched as Kolkata Durga Puja and not Bengal’s Durga Puja?The ministry wanted to pitch it as ‘The Durga Puja of India’. But, for the intangible heritage tags, the geographical location and the involvement of local communities play an important role. The historical evolution of Puja from the bonedi barir pujas of the late 18th century to the sarbajanin pujas of the early 20th century took place in Kolkata, and there is a profound artistic and community involvement. This is not visible at such a big scale anywhere else. Besides, there is a long and uninterrupted history of Puja available in Kolkata. So, we insisted on pitching for Durga Puja of Kolkata.

What does Tapati Guha Thakurta like to do when she is not in her historian/professor mode?
Well, once you are a researcher, you are always a researcher. But when I am not, I am a mother, a pet parent, a Puja enthusiast, an art lover and so many other things.


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