Beauty matters: Why Durga feels very much at home in a Jawed Habib salon
The past one year has witnessed numerous attempts by the BJP and the fringe groups of the Hindu right-wing trying to taint every possible cultural/religious festival. Very prominently, it started with rechristening Onam, a festival celebrating the homecoming of the much beloved demon king, Mahabali to Vamana Jayanti. Vamana, the wily Brahmin avatar of Vishnu acts on behalf of insecure Gods to relegate Mahabali to paatalam. Next up in West Bengal, there was a propaganda on the social media threatening people who consume fish, since fish was one of the many avatars of Lord Vishnu. Most of West Bengal, where the day begins with one haggling over the price of fish, deemed such a propaganda as comical and ridiculous, at the very least.
Now, a couple of weeks before the ultimate Bengali cultural extravaganza, it is the turn of Durga.
Since yesterday, a harmless cartoon that appeared in the local dailies of West Bengal depicting Durga and her children chilling in a Jawed Habib salon has been the cause of much offence and outrage, and has got the Sanghi chaddies in a twist. And why not! It is a Muslim man who is apparently offending our Gods.
This at a time when the last remaining secular and progressive sections of the society are shocked by the cold blooded murder of the fiercely anti-right-wing journalist, Gauri Lankesh. But should that dominate the news hour headlines, where we are questioning the despicable comments made by certain journalists and Twitter users, who are incidentally followed by the prime minister himself? Should we continue questioning the intolerant and fascist regime we find ourselves in? No! Clearly something else has to dominate the headlines and what better than, once again, indulging in our current favourite national pastimes - the ability to manufacture offence and Muslim baiting.
Much like Vamana Jayanti, the idea of Bengalis getting offended at the idea of Durga visiting a spa is laughable. The cartoon at best is a smart piece of marketing for Habib and as clarified by Jawed Habib himself, it was not his brainchild and released by the Habib franchise in West Bengal. A lawyer, Vinay Pandey from Uttar Pradesh, not even Bengal, has filed a court case against Habib and has gone to add that it has hurt the sentiments of millions of Hindus.
Clearly, Uttar Pradesh lawyers have no clue about Durga Puja traditions. One only has to visit the grand Durga Puja Pandals or see the cover designs of the Puja specials of magazines to see how Durga and her children have been humanised over the years.
The pandals that house the goddess and her children have been made out of every possible object and theme imaginable - biscuits, post cards, yellow ambassador taxis for a "nostalgia" themed pandal, et al. For all the angst-ridden right-wing trolls and bhakts, imagine an edible and writable idol of the goddess!
The cartoon made a lot of sense. Durga dressing up in a salon in 2017 is believable and legitimate. The idols are commissioned months before the actual Puja dates and as non-resident Bengali children celebrating Durga Puja in Kerala, watching idols being made by artists coming from Calcutta was a matter of great joy and excitement. The process of the idol taking shape after the clay had dried with the painting and re-painting of Durga's face was a treat to watch.
Durga and her children were always putting on make-up, much like the women prepping for the puja and other cultural activities. It is, of course, a different debate as to how domesticated the goddess has been made over the 20th century, closely aligning to the demands of the bhadralok patriarchy, but the fact remains that Durga and her children have been humanised to a large extent. (In this cartoon, she is only relaxing in a salon; before this ad, she has been pictured on magazine covers with her family cruising on a boat, supervising her kids as they play "western" instruments like the cello and electric guitar.)
I would see the artists painting her face - her cheeks and lips imbued with a deep red - and, more importantly, lining her eyes. While the make-up and clothes for her children - Ganesh, Laxmi, Saraswati and Kartik were assigned to the apprentices, it was the master artist who always put the final touches with Durga's eyes. Beauty matters. We know that from the goddess herself. Durga-like eyes - big, luminous and enhanced by copious amounts of kajal - with long and glossy black tresses have been, exasperatingly, the stuff of every mainstream bhodro Bengali man's fantasy when it comes to his woman!
So, in a way the Habib's cartoon is nothing but a contemporary take on women who want to enjoy the festivities, embracing the goodies of the market and beauty industry, taking a cue from the goddess herself. It is a marketing strategy to invite women and men to participate in India's growing trend of citizens subscribing to the body as a site of pleasure - with the goddess leading the way - and Durga Puja has long been marketed with commercial tie-ups and sponsorships.
At a time when speaking up has become an offence in itself, one you pay for with your life, there is absolutely no time and place to indulge in imagined offence manufactured by some uneducated trolls of the Indo-Gangetic valley.