Come October and the Bengali fraternity gets its annual dose of creative adrenaline.
For more than seven decades now, there has been an outpouring of artistic expression in the Bengali language during Durga Puja, which coincides with Navaratri and culminates in Vijaya Dashami. On the face of it, these cultural harvests do not seem to have much to do with religion or devotion. True, they are manifestations of the joy and festivity surrounding the yearly sojourn of Durga — the consort of Shiva and slayer of Mahishasura — to her parental home. And for these few days, the Bengali consciousness is tuned to the thrill and exaltation of Giriraj and Menaka bringing home their princess of a daughter, Gauri (another name for Durga). And the carnival begins. New novels are published, poetry written, literary supplements blossom, movies are released and plays enacted. Generically, these creative outputs during Durga Puja are all called Puja Shankha (Puja numbers). And the most awaited of them have always been the Puja songs.
In the late 1960s, famed scriptwriter Sachin Bhowmik promised to write the lyrics of a Bengali song for R.D. Burman, who wanted to compose, sing and release it as a Durga Puja number. But a stream of assignments for screenplays, like that of Brahmachari and Aradhana , kept Bhowmik from fulfilling the promise. Finally, in 1969, Bhowmik penned down a song dedicated to his college-day flame. To protect her identity, he changed her name in the song to Ruby Roy — ‘Mone pore Ruby Roy?’ (Do you remember Ruby Roy?) the song goes. R.D. composed the tune and sang it as well, and it went on to become the hit of Puja 1969.
Cut to 1973. The composition reappeared in its Hindi avatar when R.D. used it in the film Anamika and had it sung by Kishore Kumar. ‘Mere bhigi bhigi si’ appeals to romantics even today after 40 years.
There are only a few criteria laid down for a Durga Puja number.
First, it has to be an original composition. It has to be in Bengali. And it must be released during Durga Puja, not in a film, but as a Puja number. But that never prevented other language singers from lending their voices. Lata Mangeshkar recorded her first Bengali song way back in 1955, not for a Bengali film but for a Durga Puja number. That was the beginning of Lata’s almost uninterrupted Durga Puja releases over the years. There were the Bengali artistes like S.D. Burman, R.D. Burman, Hemant Kumar, Kishore Kumar and Manna Dey, but there was also Md. Rafi, Asha Bhosle and Mukesh. The R.D. Burman-Asha Bhosle combination sizzled from the mid-1960s for 30 years until the sudden demise of R.D. The rocking Bollywood song ‘Jaa ne ja, dhundta phir raha’ sung by Kishore Kumar and Asha Bhosle for the film Jawani Diwani (1972) is the Hindi remake of a 1971 R.D-Asha Durga Puja duet.
The Pujas in Kolkata became a great platform for composers like Salil Chowdhury, S.D. Burman and R.D. to create and experiment with compositions. Chowdhury’s 1959 Puja composition for Lata Mangeshkar reappeared next year as one of the most endearing songs of Hindi cinema: ‘O sajana, barkha bahar aayi’. Chowdhury hit the creative jackpot again in 1969 with the Mukesh song ‘Kahin door jab din dhal jaye’ for Anand. Yesudas’ ‘Nisa gama pani sare ga, ga gare mitwa’ for Anand Mahal will haunt listeners for a long, long time. The original Bengali versions of both these songs were launched for the 1969 Pujas and were sung by Hemanta Mukhopadhyay (Hemant Kumar) and Sandhya Mukhopadhyay.
In 1974, saw a twist in the tale. Lata Mangeshkar and Kishore Kumar got into entered a pact. Lata would compose for Kishore’s Puja number and Kishore in turn would do the same for Lata. Both the songs clicked.
This outburst of musicality during Puja creates one of the largest bodies of non-film light music or laghu sangeet in India. And it is likely the world’s only religious occasion that inspires so much secular creativity. In this, as in so many other ways, Kolkata’s cultural contribution to India’s fabric is unique.
