Beyond Durga Puja season: How Purba & Paschim Medinipur’s migrating ‘dhaakis’ eke out a living the rest of the year

‘Dhaak’ as a profession has become less seasonal with a growing fervour of Hindu religious festivals & lack of other livelihood options
From Midnapore to Delhi: How Durga Puja's migrating ‘dhaakis’ eke out a living the rest of the year
Tarapada Patra (right) playing at a CR Park pandalAuthor provided
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Fluffy clouds against an azure sky, mellowing summers, tufts of kash flowers along the highways and the smell of ‘saptaparni’ beginning to fill up the air — the indications of an approaching Durga Puja are plenty. But nothing heralds the festival like the sharp, pulsating and inviting sound of the dhaak (drum) on a bright autumn morning. 

Dhaak is a large, traditional drum made and played by generations of artists from West Bengal, as an essential part of Durga Puja and some other Hindu festivals in the eastern state as well as Bengali communities in the rest of India. 

It is an artform practised as a profession in several districts of West Bengal, mostly by people belonging to the Schedules Castes and has battled the COVID-19 slowdown to emerge as a stable livelihood for many of the artists. 

Dhaaks stationed at the CR Park's Cooperative Ground pandal as the dhaakis take a break.
Dhaaks stationed at the CR Park's Cooperative Ground pandal as the dhaakis take a break. Author provided

Although the income isn’t handsome, it is here to remain as the mainstay of the dhaakis (the dhaak players) because of its strong link with the rituals, lack of alternative livelihood options and the growing list of occasions that employ them. 

“Almost 90 per cent of the employable people in my area are dhaakis,” beamed the 25-year-old Biswajit Patra from Contai in Purba Medinipur in West Bengal. The figure may not be accurate but the young dhaaki gives us a sense of how large the dhaaki community is in the coastal city.

Biswajit was speaking inside the Purbachal Puja Samity in Delhi’s Chittaranjan Park, where a majority of the drummers were from Medinipur. He is a third generation dhaaki and has been booked by the puja committee for the last four years to perform along with three other drummers from Contai. 

The young drummer has grown up listening to the dhaak and used to accompany his father to these CR Park pandals to play kasar (a brass gong bell used to maintain the rhythm) when he was younger. He wanted to be a professional tabla player and even took lessons for a few years, while also enrolling himself in a local college for a Bachelor of Arts degree. But he had to give it all up to support his family who are members of the Dom community, a Scheduled Caste in West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha and Bihar.

One day, his father just put him in charge of the drums at a pandal instead of the accompanying kasar and he played like a natural. 

While he complains that despite being poor, his family has stopped receiving state benefits because of their leftwing inclinations, he maintains that playing the dhaak provides steady income because they get work throughout the year. “With the Ganesh Puja, the festival season commences and we are asked to play the dhaak by people worshipping Durga, Kali, Lakshmi, Saraswati, Shiva, Manasa, Vishwakarma and some other deities within Purba and Pashchim Medinipur as well as other districts. There’s hardly a lean month,” he noted. 

Migrating to Delhi for the five days of the Durga Puja makes financial sense for them because they make Rs 10,000-Rs 12,000 more in the capital than they would in Kolkata and significantly more than any other place in Bengal. “In Delhi, each dhaaki makes more than Rs 20,000,” said Biswajit.

The puja committees who book them with bayna (an advance) also provide them accommodation and food. They have to pay for the train fare, which is about Rs 1,000 individually because they travel in sleeper class.

He and his father earn a combined income of around Rs 80,000 annually by playing the dhaak. The other generational livelihood of their family is weaving trays, baskets, winnowing clatter and other handicrafts items with bamboo cane. These items are picked up by traders from their home. This work, mostly done by his elder brother and rest of the family members, fetches them Rs 50,000-60,000 a year, he added. “I am glad to have selected dhaak as my profession.”

While Patra’s story is of a happy reconciliation with dhaak, Tarapada Patra (45) from Paschim Medinipur associates the instrument with feelings of pride and honour to be able to perform this vital role at the Durga Puja. 

“The very genesis of the dhaak is based on the Ramayana. Hanuman brought back mango seeds from Lanka and introduced the tree to the region. Dhaak is traditionally made from mango wood because it is light and is perfect for producing the deep sound that creates an intense atmosphere required to invoke the Goddess. The instrument was played during Ram’s worship of Durga before going to war with Ravana to bring back Sita (akalbodhon),” Tarapada shared.

Tarapada Patra and his brother-in-law playing during Saptami's sandhya arati and dhunuchi naach.
Tarapada Patra and his brother-in-law playing during Saptami's sandhya arati and dhunuchi naach. Author provided

Not just Durga Puja, other festivals like Shiber Gajan (worship of Lord Shiva) are incomplete without the dhaak beats, he added. Like the last 15 years, this year too he was playing at the Sarbojanin Puja Samity in CR Park’s D block.

As a child, Patra would accompany his father at Durga Puja pandals in north Indian areas like Delhi and Kashmir. Now, his son has also joined the profession and accompanies his father, who is now 70, to pandals near their home.

These days, even political parties book them to perform at their rallies, indicating how the dhaak has become a reflection of Bengali sentiment and culture. “Around 100 dhaakis were brought on board to perform at Amit Shah’s rally before the last general election.”

There is also a dhaak school that has opened up in Purba Medinipur and many more may be started soon, Patra said, adding that he also wishes to open up a training centre of his own in a couple of years.

Although his son is not all that keen about the musical aspect of the dhaak like he was as a child and still is, alternatives either don’t exist or are not lucrative. The family has a small farm but that isn’t enough to be someone's livelihood.

“There is just no other job. In many dhaaki households, children have graduated but are unemployed.”

Tarapada acknowleged the state support his family received. His father is a beneficiary of the Lokprasar Prakalpo started by the Mamata Banerjee government, wherein elderly folk artists receive Rs 1,000 each.

Both Biswajit and Tarapada added that they are part of musical bands where they play percurssion instruments to perform at events such as weddings.

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