Durga Puja in Kolkata | Global Knowledge Systems

Overview

Durga Puja is an annual festival celebrated in September or October, most notably in Kolkata, in West Bengal of India, but also in other parts of India and amongst the Bengali diaspora. It marks the ten-day worship of the Hindu mother-goddess Durga. In the months preceding the festival, small artisanal workshops sculpt images of Durga and her family using unfired clay pulled from the Ganga River. The worship of the goddess then begins on the inaugural day of Mahalaya, when eyes are painted onto the clay images to bring the goddess to life. It ends on the tenth day, when the images are immersed in the river from where the clay came. Thus, the festival has also come to signify ‘home-coming’ or a seasonal return to one’s roots. Durga Puja is seen as the best instance of the public performance of religion and art, and as a thriving ground for collaborative artists and designers. The...

This record is imported from the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage public dataset as discovery metadata. ARED has not independently verified community authority, access protocols or local naming beyond the source record.

Community and Authority

Communities: India
Languages: Not specified in UNESCO dataset
Cultural territories: India
Countries: India

How the System Works

Music, Performance and Oral Literature Material Culture, Design and Technology Ceremony, Spirituality and Cosmology Migration, Diaspora and Urban Life Ways of Knowing and Knowledge Transmission

Sources and Evidence

Imported from UNESCO DataHub dataset ich001. Field-level provenance is retained in the record metadata.

UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage ListsDataset

Open original source record

Field-Level Provenance

title: UNESCO DataHub field title_en
preferredTitle: UNESCO DataHub field title_fr
summary: UNESCO DataHub field description_en
type: UNESCO DataHub fields type_of_element_en and type_acronym
countries: UNESCO DataHub field countries, ISO codes resolved with ISO-3166 regional metadata
categories: ARED category inference from UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names and title
relationships: UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names, type fields and World Heritage links
sourceUrl: UNESCO DataHub field http_url_en
rights: UNESCO DataHub dataset metadata license and license_url

Original Source Metadata

uuid03cd45fe-1aff-4de6-b383-371e9b236f39

ich_public_ref703

inscription_year2021

title_enDurga Puja in Kolkata

title_frLa Durga Puja à Calcutta

type_of_element_enRepresentative List

type_acronymRL

countriesIN

http_url_enhttps://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/00703

concepts_primary_namesHandicrafts, Sculpture

concepts_secondary_namesArchitecture, Competition, Cultural exhibitions, Festivals, Hinduism, Musical instruments, Painting, Rituals, Temples, Trade, Visual arts

main_image_urlhttps://ich.unesco.org/img/photo/thumb/14190-LRG.jpg

main_image_caption_enThe full goddess ensemble, sculpted in alluvial clay, still to be painted, clothed and ornamented at a workshoip at Kumartuli, the oldest and main image-makers' hub in the city.

main_image_copyrightDevi Chakrabarti, India, 2018

main_image_authorNot supplied

videoshttps://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/Az8SGiqk9-o

images[object Object], [object Object], [object Object]

Why This Record Is Credible

This public record is connected to 1 source and has been labelled Source Supported. ARED separates evidence sources from cultural authority so users can see both provenance and review limits.

Cultural Access

Use this as public discovery metadata only. It does not replace community authority or local access protocols.

Relationships

Handicrafts Sculpture Architecture Competition Cultural exhibitions Festivals Hinduism Musical instruments Painting Rituals UNESCO representative list

Review and Corrections

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