Durga Puja: Mahatma Gandhi-like Mahishasura gets new look

Until late Sunday evening, the Asura sported a bald head, spectacles, white moustache and a walking stick

The idol at the puja organised by the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha in Calcutta shows Goddess Durga slaying not Mahishasura the demon but a bald bespectacled man with a stick whose resemblance to Mahatma Gandhi, the organisation said, was coincidental: File Photo

Arkamoy Datta Majumdar   |   TT  |  Calcutta   |  04.10.22 : The Mahishasura resembling Mahatma Gandhi at a Right-wing Hindu outfit’s Durga Puja here got a new look late on Sunday night following public outrage, with spectacles gone and a wig and black moustache added.

The Puja organisers, the Bengal chapter of the Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha, alleged that a police team had arrived and forcibly changed the demon’s appearance, but the police denied the accusation.

“I received a call late on Sunday evening. The callers identified themselves as representatives of the Union home ministry. They told me that the Mahishasura has to be changed,” said Chandrachur Goswami, working president of the Mahasabha’s state unit.

“Later, a group of policemen brought an artist with them. The artist altered the look of the Asura, ignoring our opposition to any change.”

New look

Until late Sunday evening, the Asura at the Puja — near the Ruby crossing on EM Bypass —sported a bald head, spectacles, white moustache and a walking stick. By night, it had curly hair and a black moustache but no spectacles.

Senior officers from the Calcutta police denied Goswami’s allegation. They said the look of the Mahishasura was changed immediately after news reached the organisers that a case had been drawn up at Kasba police station following a complaint.

“A case was drawn up under IPC sections that deal with provocation for religious enmity through words or actions,” a senior officer said.

He said the case invoked penal sections such as 153B (creating disturbance and unrest among religious, racial, language or regional group or caste or community), 188 (disobedience to order duly promulgated by public servant), 283 (danger or obstruction in public way or line of navigation) and 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention).

Goswami had told The Telegraph on Sunday that the demon’s resemblance to Gandhi was “purely coincidental”. On Monday, the Mahasabha staged a dharna at the Puja venue to protest the police’s alleged defacement of the idol.

Trinamul Congress leader Kunal Ghosh said the initial look of the Mahishasura was the “height of indecency” and a matter of “national shame”. The CPM and the Congress have demanded action against the Puja organisers. The Bengal BJP too has condemned the alleged depiction of Gandhi as the demon.

State Congress leaders have lodged at least two police complaints since Sunday evening.