COVID-19 set to dampen Ganesh festival in Mumbai

Shiv Kumar
Tribune News Service
Mumbai, May 10

The Maharashtra government may not permit public celebrations of the Ganesh festival this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to officials here.

The 10-day Ganesh festival falls on August 22 this year. However, work on the giant idols of the elephant-headed god, which usually begin from May has not been taken up so far because of the pandemic.

 “The big mandals have not yet placed orders for the idols as we do not know whether the government will allow public celebrations this year,” says Naresh Dahibavkar, president of the Brihanmumbai Sarvajanik Ganeshotsav Samanvay Samiti, the umbrella body of the Ganesh pandals.

Sources in the state government say permissions, if given at all, would be just weeks before the actual festival depending on how the pandemic is tackled in Mumbai.

Organisers of Ganesh pandals say it would be too late for them because finalising designs of the idols, placing orders, and collecting sponsorships would all take several months.

“Many of office-bearers of the Ganesh mandals are professionals and small businessmen whose incomes have been badly hit by the lockdown,” says Sameer Patil, a Ganesh mandal organiser from Borivali in suburban Mumbai.

According to craftsmen in Maharashtra’s Pen taluka, where scores of small idols installed at homes are crafted, work has begun on a small scale in many villages.

“We are planning to put up pandals as we expect the lockdown to be relaxed in the coming weeks,” says Subash Natu, who put up a small banner at Borivali in suburban Mumbai. Natu hopes to ferry in a few idols by road by July for sale to residents in the suburb.

However health department officials warned that social distancing during the immersion of the idols could be a problem as huge crowds throng water bodies.

Meanwhile, several organisations in Mumbai are asking people to pray indoors like it was done during the bubonic plague of 1896.

“The public festival was cancelled that year and people prayed indoors,” says Dahibavkar.