
The celebration of Durga Puja and it's and other accompaniments to this has
a lot to do with the economy of the autism such us decorators and craftsmen.
To common a commoner this festival is a four to five days enjoyment.
Kumartooly, the famous idol market of the world gets busy from around mid
April. Decorators of Pandel from Contai and the electrician of Chandannagar
depend there living on this festival. So to fulfill their target they put
their back breaking labour and brain hammering thinking of doing new designs.
The electricians of Chandannagar do design new aspects of display from the
information they see in the newspaper. Each year a current affair has been
design and the Samity that display it draws the most visitors for the period.
These engineers slogged for three to four months in a year. The rest of the
year is supported with very minimum economic income from other sources. This
year with the high shooting cost of every item the contract to be sign between
them and the samities will increase by fifty percent. To combat this high cost
the samities have made plans how to meet it. What then inspires these people
to work. It may be sum up that this is but an addiction and not a source of
earning.
Though in town there have grown many decorating out fits to meet the
demands of this festival, yet famous samities do not approach the local
decorators but they contact the people of Contai. These Contai workers have a
very genuine way of working and their design are eye catching. The start of
erection if viewed through out one can calculate that cheapest of material are
used for the purpose. Yet the final product seen by visitors from beyond the
locality preys them as something that has come out of a dream. The laborers in
these pandels earns five to six thousand for the period and the rest spend in
the harvest field. It is known that each of these pandels has a costing of
around 2.5 to 3 Lakhs. The contract is after the festival do use these bamboo
and decorative for other purposes such as marriage or any other local
function. The contractor also to economise himself do hire some inexperience
workers to meet the work load from Bangoan or Diamond Harbor areas. This trade
has yet to receive an industry status.
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