Why I Hate Pujo (not personal)

because everybody pretends that it's this magnanimous festival accommodating all communities...and that is BULLSHIT...look at the street children and the dispossessed people in Singur and Nandigram...think about how everybody chose to forget about the Rizwanur incident during the last Pujo...and I know what I'm talking about because I met many people who seemed angry at the presence of the fun spoiling signature collectors to say nothing of the picture of a person belonging to another religious community...and here we the rich kids go gallivanting in the most expensive clothes to see pandals made with crores of rupees most of which (the money not the pandal, of course) go to the Pujo committee members (and not the poor rural artisans)...if half that amount was spent on the really needy then all the street children could have had decent meals and clothes for the rest of the year...and if we believe so much in communal harmony then why do we calcuttans not celebrate Eid or Christmas with as much gusto?I have never been to a midnight mass or celebrated eid with new clothes...nor do I know very many Durga Puja enthusiasts do that...and if Durga Puja (as sooo many assert) is not a religious festival at all but a four days excuse to enjoy, then why can we not choose a festival less imbued with religiosity like Basantotsav (which is not the same as Holi and was instituted by Rabindranath Thakur exactly to fill this gap in terms of non -religioius festivity) or Nabanno or New Year for that matter? in fact, we do celebrate new year but the suggestion to replacing Pujo with new year would sound blasphemous to all, isn't it?