Effigy makers sweat it out as Dasehra nears

Charanjit Singh Teja

Advertisement

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, September 17

With the Dasehra festival round the corner, residents of Hindustan Basti and Lohgarh Gate have started assembling effigies of Ravana in the city. The Lohgarh Gate is the major market of the effigies from where most of the Dasehra committees buy effigies.

Men along with kids and women are busy making effigies at their homes. More than 100 families from Uttar Pradesh have been working 24x7 to meet the demand for the effigies, which would be celebrated on September 30. Men usually install the bamboos to make the structures. Elderlies give shape to heads and crowns by cutting the bamboo in pieces. Women cover the bamboos with hard papers and the school-going children paint the body with ink and decorate it with colourful papers. The main artistes give the final shape to the faces of the effigies.

The effigies of Ravana are also available in all seizes. “Earlier, the maximum height of an effigy used to be 60 ft, as it was quite heavy to transport. With the emergence of ditch machines now, we make effigies up to 200 ft in height. The purchasing power of the Dasehra committees has also increased. They spend Rs 3 to Rs 5 lakh on an effigy,” said Vinod, an effigy maker.

Meanwhile, children make small effigies which are 1 ft or 2 ft long. Suraj, a child in the locality, says, “I make one effigy daily that is priced at Rs 200.”

Harish, another effigy maker, said, “It is our part-time job that lasts only for two months in a year. Otherwise, I do labour work. I love this work as my parents and grandparents have been doing this. Now, my brothers and our sons also do the same work. I enjoy the festivities while making the effigies.”