Navaratri and Durga Puja

How it is kept

1. 01

   Ghatasthapana: a kalash on a bed of sown barley, kept lit for nine days

2. 02

   Recitation of the Durga Saptashati

3. 03

   Kanya puja on Ashtami or Navami: young girls fed and honoured as the Devi

4. 04

   Garba and dandiya raas round the garbo lamp in Gujarat

5. 05

   Pandal pujas, Sandhi Puja and sindur khela in Bengal

6. 06

   Golu, the stepped display of dolls, in the south

01The Devi Mahatmya

The thirteen chapters of the Markandeya Purana known as the Devi Mahatmya, or Durga Saptashati, are the scripture of these nights. The devas, driven from heaven by Mahishasura, poured out their anger, and from their combined tejas the Devi took form; each gave her a weapon, Shiva his trident, Vishnu his discus, Himavan a lion. She slew Mahishasura, then Dhumralochana, Chanda and Munda, Raktabija, and Shumbha and Nishumbha. In the twelfth chapter she herself says that whoever hears this account in the autumn worship will be freed from every trouble.

02Rama’s untimely worship

The Devi was worshipped in spring, but the Bengali Ramayana of Krittibas Ojha (fifteenth century), with the Kalika Purana and Devi Bhagavata, tells that Shri Rama, before the last battle with Ravana, woke her out of season in autumn, the akal bodhan. He needed 108 blue lotuses; one was missing, and he was about to offer his own lotus-like eye when the Devi stopped him and gave her blessing. Bengal’s Durga Puja follows this pattern: bodhan on Shashthi, the nine plants of navapatrika bathed on Saptami, Sandhi Puja at the joining of Ashtami and Navami with 108 lamps and lotuses, and farewell on Dashami.

03Rajbari to barowari

In Kolkata the Shobhabazar Rajbari puja of Raja Nabakrishna Deb dates from 1757. The first barowari, a puja paid for by twelve friends of a village rather than one zamindar, is said to have been held at Guptipara in Hooghly around 1790, and from it came today’s community pandals. UNESCO inscribed Durga Puja in Kolkata in 2021 and the Garba of Gujarat in 2023. In the south the same nights are kept with the Golu, steps of dolls, and with Saraswati Puja on Navami, when books and tools are laid before the Devi.

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