DURGA PUJA (Durgotsab)

The festive season has arrived. Mahalaya is the day when Goddess Durga leaves her abode in the Himalayas to come down to her mother’s place in Bengal. Her four children accompany...

an annual Hindu festival in South Asia that celebrates worship of the Hindu goddess Durga. It refers to all the six days observed as Mahalaya, Shashthi , Maha Saptami, Maha Ashtami, Maha Nabami and Bijoya Dashami. The dates of Durga Puja celebrations are set according to the traditional Hindu calendar and the fortnight corresponding to the festival is called Debi Pokkho.


Durga Puja is widely celebrated in the Indian states of West Bengal, Assam, Jharkhand, Orissa and Tripura where it is a five-day annual holiday. Not only it is the biggest Hindu festival celebrated throughout the State, but it is also the most significant socio-cultural event in Bengali society. Apart from eastern India, Durga Puja is also celebrated in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Punjab, Kashmir, Karnataka and Kerala. Durga Puja is also celebrated as a major festival in Nepal and in Bangladesh where 10% population are Hindu. Nowadays, many diaspora Bengali cultural organizations arrange for Durgotsab in countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, France, and Kuwait, among others. In 2006, a grand Durga Puja ceremony was held in the Great Court of the British Museum.

 The prominence of Durga Puja increased gradually during the British Raj in Bengal. After the Hindu reformists resemble Durga with India, she had become an icon for the Indian independence movement. In the first quarter of the 20th century, the tradition of Baroyari or Community Puja was popularised due to this. After independence, Durga Puja became one of the largest celebrated festivals in the whole world.

A Grain of Sand (Chokher Bali)

The literal meaning of ‘Chokher Bali’ is the sand particle that lodges itself in the eye and acts as an irritant. Here the novel’s protagonist Binodini, a beautiful young widow, is playing the role of the ‘grain of sand’ and lodges herself in the house of Mahendra and Asha, newly married couple and living in total conjugal bliss.Binodini playfully proposes to Asha that they be ‘chokher bali’ to each other,she infuses the added dimension of reciprocity into the function which of course means both the woman will rub each other in the wrong way.

The couple’s harmonious relationship takes an unexpected turn when Mahendra falls for Binodini. Mahendra’s closest friend and classmate at medical college, Behari, is also smitten with Binodini. Poor and illliterate Asha helplessly witnesses the changes taking place within the otherwise simple and smooth relationships. Her mother in-law,Rajlaksmi, initially accuses her of not being able to manage the household and her son but soon becomes her closest ally. Binodini, who claims to be Asha’s wellwisher and her friend and guide in relationships, slowly succumbs to Mahendra’s love. Binodini,the protagonist is a self willed, intelligent, beautiful and somewhat confused woman who wants everything at one go without losing anything. Despite of the illicit relationship with Mahendra, she realizes that her true love-her secret passion is for Behari, which she is never able to express.

The plot revolves round the complexities of the relationships, love, insecurity and jealousy. It takes the reader through a whirlpool of emotions. On one hand the novel is a sensational account of illicit relationships and on the other an emotional interplay between 5 strong characters of the story-Mahendra, Behari,Asha,Rajlaksmi and Binodini.

OUR TAGORE

RABINDRA NATH THAKUR

Rabindranath tegore was born into a distinguished Bengali family in Calcutta, West Bengal on 1861. His father's name was the Maharishi Debendranath Tagore, a well known Hindu reformer and mystic and his mother was Shrimati Sharada Devi.

Tagore received his education at home.He was taught in Bengali, with English lessons in the afternoon. He read the Bengali poets since his early age and himself began writing poetry himself by the age of eight.

 Rabindranath Tagore did have a brief spell at St Xavier's Jesuit school, but found the conventional system of education uncongenial.

His father wanted him to become a barrister and he was sent to England for this reason.

In England, Tagore heard John Bright and W.E.Gladstone speak and was highly impressed and inspired by their "large-hearted, radical liberalism." In 1879, he enrolled at University College, at London, but was called back by his father to return to India in 1880.

By l883 he was married. Tagore's  family chose his bride, an almost illiterate girl of ten named Bhabatarini (renamed Mrinalini), whom he married with little ceremony.
They were to have four children, the eldest was born when Mrinalini was 13. However, Mrinalini died at the age of 30.

From 1890, Tagore had undertaken the management of his family estates.

His earliest poetic collections Manasi (l890), Chitra (1895) and Sonar Tari (1895) used colloquial Bengali instead of the usual archaic literary form.
In 1901 he founded the famous Shantiniketan near Calcutta. This was designed to provide a  traditional ashram and Western education. He began with 5 pupils and 5 teachers (three of whom were Christian). His ideals were simplicity of living and the cultivation of beauty.

In 1912, Tagore visited Britain again and his own English translation of Gitanjali was published under Yeats' auspices. A lecture tour of Britain and the USA followed.


In 1913, he was awarded the famous Nobel Prize and used the prize money to improve his school at Shantiniketan. 


Apart from his poetry, he held major exhibitions of his paintings in the West. He was also a noted composer. His works and his life influenced film director Shri Satyajit Ray, who had been one of his pupils.


Tagore was not politically motivated and tried to harmonise the views of east and west.


In August 1941, Shri Rabindranath Tagore was moved from Shantiniketan ashram to Calcutta for an operation.

 
In the same year  i.e 1941, he passes away in the same house in which he was born in.

                                                                   THE END

I Think

Ability will never catchup with the demand for it.

Think all the beauty still left around u and be happy.

What u do,the way u think...make u beautiful.

Many men's reputation would not know his character if they met on the street.

A men's character is his fate.


Some things have to be believed to be think.

Unless u believe, u will not understand

The children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers.

Truth is the only safe ground to stand on.

Hope is a walking dreams.

By far the best proof is experience.

If u think u can win, u can win.Fiat is necessary to victory.

Before god we all r equally wise....... and equally foolish.

Hope is a walking dream. Hope is only the love of life.

A good home must be made not bought.

The day is for honest man and the night is for thieves

One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.

Love is difficult realization that something other than oneself is real.

We can only learn to love by loving.

There's only one way to have a happy marriage and as soon as i learn that it is I'LL get married again.

Respect a man he will do the more.




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