A festival of elephantine proportions

Widely believed to be among the most visited shrines in India, the Sri Venkateswara temple at Tirupati receives some 50,000 devotees on an average day. 1,200 km away, in winding queues that stretch as far as 6 km, an idol Ganesha, was thronged by about three lakh devotees every day for 11 days ending Sunday. Over three times the number of spectators in Beijing’s Bird’s Nest at full capacity, that was the daily gathering at Lalbaugcha Raja, an audience with whom mandates a wait that can last up to eight to 12 hours

Mumbai’s annual Ganesha festival has asserted once again that there can be no numerical outdoing of the frantic financial capital: There were 8,805 sarvajanik Ganesha mandals (that organise the Ganpati pandals for public viewing) in 2005. That number is now 11,000 says N Dahibaonkar, chairperson of the coordination committee of all these mandals. According to him, there were 15 lakh people at Girgaum Chowpatty on Sunday evening, a little over the population of Goa.

Each year, the numbers swell: Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) statistics say a total of 1,61,995 idols were immersed in 2007. This year’s number: 1,76,035.

The embellishments, too are even more vivid: Lalbaugcha Raja tied up with a portal for daily SMS updates; just the diamond-studded tilak on the forehead of the Goud Saraswat Brahmin Mandal’s Ganesha idol was worth Rs 14 lakh; all big mandals had queue systems within halls or adjacent grounds; a slew of mandals demanded Z-plus security from the Mumbai Police (but didn’t get it from a force already spread too thin).

Needless to add, the amplified crowd presence makes it a big advertising event too, while celebrities and politicians use the chance to improve their visibility.

So, if South Mumbai Congress MP Milind Deora was visiting mandals until 2 am towards the end of the 11-day period, Bharatiya Janata Party Assembly ticket-hopeful Shaina NC organised an eco-friendly Ganpati contest, with 112 big mandals participating. No politician trying to reach out to an electorate can ignore the Ganpati platform, she said, admitting quite candidly that money and politics are major players in the annual Ganesha festivities.

That explains the rapid proliferation of mandals too, says one civic activist: The vested interest is to grow using religion as a platform. And in the process, a quiet polarisation of people resumes along the lines of region and religion.

Long after the diplomats, annually invited as guests to witness the spectacle from a BMC-erected dais at Girgaum Chowpatty, left for home on Sunday night, as the last big idols made their way into the sea, the most terror-sensitive Ganesha season ever was over. Mumbai’s police personnel can catch their breath for a few minutes before moving on to bandobast duty for what will be an equally edgy Id.

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