Poush Mela draws to a close after 6 days, stall dismantling from today
Times of India | 29 December 2024
12 Bolpur: The six-day Poush Mela at Santiniketan ended on Saturday night with shops closing the ledger at 11.30pm.
At a meeting at Visva-Bharati vice chancellor's chamber, which was attended by minister Chandranath Sinha and senior district officials, it was decided that a joint inspection team, comprising university officials, administrative officials and traders' representatives, would oversee the dismantling of stalls on Sunday morning. "The concept of a ‘bhanga mela' is now a thing of the past," said interim VC Binoy Kumar Saren.
Whilst the fair went on for six days, Poush Utsav and Binodan Mancha programmes were limited to four.
In other years, after Poush Mela ended officially, traders would continue to sell their products at the ‘bhanga mela', sometimes at a much lower price, attracting a large number of visitors. But this year, announcements were made by V-B officials as well as traders' associations that no such extension would be granted. Swapna Das, who sold handmade jewellery at the fair, said, "We have to pay Rs 17,000 for this stall. Two extra days' business would have definitely helped, earlier we earned a lot from bhanga mela."
Anil Konar, representing Santiniketan Trust, said, "There will be no compromise with ‘bhanga mela' beyond six days. The district administration will take action if anyone fails to leave the space within the deadline. But we hope there will be no problem as a record number of people has already visited the fair and traders are happy with six days of business."
Additional police superintendent Rana Mukherjee said, "There was a strong police vigil. Around 500 suspects were detained, among whom 250 were booked. A joint team will visit the stalls at night, and we will have to send a report to NGT by Jan 31 on clean-up."