Oslo: Women from the expatriate Iranian community in Norway participated in the iconic ritual of Sindoor Khela – in which Bengali women apply vermilion to Goddess Durga and one another to celebrate womanhood and togetherness – and asked whether they are looking as Indian heroines.
A Durga Puja organised by the Bengali diaspora in Oslo has gained considerable popularity. The festival was celebrated with much fanfare this year as well.
While Kolkata and other parts of West Bengal continued to experience the tail end of the monsoon even after Mahalaya, Oslo has already witnessed its first spell of snowfall this season, with winter gloom and shorter days setting in.
After enjoying daylight until midnight in July, the city, where temperatures are now hovering around -1 degrees Celsius, is switching on its lights by around 9 pm, as reported by The Statesman.
Kamalika Lodh, an electrical engineer from Behala, who moved to Oslo with her husband more than a decade ago, narrated how around 100 Bengalis in the Norwegian capital gather over a weekend during the peak Puja period to celebrate the festival.
“Amid busy work schedules, it is difficult for the entire community to take leave,” Kamalika, one of the founders of the Oslo Durgotsav Committee, said.
“Unable to follow the actual muhurat timings, we combine the Sashti and Saptami rituals on one day and complete the four-day celebrations over a two-day weekend,” she said.
Though Saptami was observed over two days back home this year, Kamalika and her fellow community members organised their Durga Puja celebration from Friday evening to Monday morning.
However, Durga Puja in the Nordic country is as inclusive as it is in the homeland of the Bengalis.
“Our Puja celebrations include a large number of non-Bengali Indians. Apart from Indians, many Iranian and Bangladeshi Muslims also participate in the festivities. Our Sindoor Khela ritual is particularly popular among Iranian women. Many of them love smearing vermilion on their cheeks and ask whether they look like Indian heroines and women,” Kamalika said.
Oslo’s largest Durga Puja committee celebrated its 10th anniversary this year. The organisation is striving to preserve Bengali cultural roots among younger generations by retaining traditional rituals and customs.
From a dhaak procured from London, purohits who work as IT professionals in Oslo, puja articles sourced from a local Sri Lankan store, to an idol imported from Kumartuli in Kolkata, the organisers recreated the feel of a traditional household puja thousands of miles away in the northern reaches of Scandinavia.
