Durga Puja gate culture cashes in on ads but chokes Kolkata roads
Times of India | 16 September 2025While their stated aim is to enhance the festive spirit, the hidden motive is to secure a premium advertising space in the thick of the city's traffic flow.
They function like artificial choke points — slowing vehicles, forcing abrupt lane changes, and creating congestion far beyond their immediate footprint, complain commuters.
"This ubiquitous ‘gate culture' is a relatively new phenomenon," said Debojyoti Dutta, a leading publisher and a city enthusiast. "Earlier, there used to be simpler scaffolding — mostly flat frames with small bulbs strung across. Those did not intrude into carriageways.
But now, organisers build huge arches with bulky bamboo bases on both sides. It disrupts traffic flow and often damages trees too," he added.
The bamboo plinths that support these gates have expanded over the years to accommodate ever-larger commercial banners. In many cases, branches of roadside trees are hacked off to improve the visibility of these advertisements, said climate crusader, Ajay Mittal.
"The city has very limited road space. When you insert bulky gate structures into the middle of roads, you are effectively reducing carriageway width.
This is why you see snarls even during non-peak hours during the puja season," said urban mobility expert, Anirban Roy. "The visual clutter may be festive, but the functional cost is real," he added. Moreover, the structures sprout a fortnight before the puja and remain in place for 15 days after the festival is over.
Commuters say these gates are as hazardous for pedestrians as they are for motorists.
"They block sightlines. A speeding two-wheeler emerges from behind the gate and the pedestrian barely has reaction time.
It's risky, especially at night," said homemaker, Swati Dey, who regularly walks her child to school in south Kolkata. "The sidewalks are completely taken over by hawkers, forcing us to walk on the carriageway. These gates are making us vulnerable to approaching vehicles," she added.
Many puja committees actively pitch gate space to advertisers as "premium exposure points", competing for sponsorships. With more money at stake each year, the gates have only grown taller, flashier, and more intrusive. "There is nothing wrong with celebrations," said a senior traffic police official, "but road safety and public space can't be compromised. This calls for regulation." "These gates welcome visitors, create a sense of celebration, and help us raise sponsorships that keep the event running," said Somnath Das of Santoshpur Lake Pally, adding that the organisers try to ensure road safety.
For senior organiser of a north Kolkata puja Bibhuti Banerjee, it's the festive identity of our puja.
