What is the history of Jagadhatri Puja in West Bengal?

Most Indians know that freedom fighter Bal Gangadhar Tilak started Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Bombay (now Mumbai) as a means to awaken cultural and religious soul of Hindus under a regressive colonial era. This became so popular over the years that it awakened the Hindu society in the western part of the country politically and helped people joined freedom struggle. Something similar happened in Bengal couple of centuries earlier in a barbaric Islamic rule.

Maharaja (king) Krishnachandra of Krishnanagar (currently district headquarter of Nadia) was the first to introduce Jagaddhatri Puja in Bengal in 1754. According to the popular story, Maharaja Krishnachandra of Nadia was imprisoned for failing to pay royal taxes to the Nawab of Bengal, Alivardi Khan. When he was finally released from the Nawab's prison, the Durga festival was almost over. The king, tired and depressed because he could not attend the puja, fell asleep in a boat. Legend has it that Krishnachandra had a dream in which a red-haired four-armed Kumari Devi told him to worship her on the auspicious ‘shuklanavami’ of the next Kartik month of Hindu calender.

Maharaja Krishnachandra initiated Jagaddhatri Puja in which is similar to Durga Goddess. Two forms of the same goddess, one is Durga, the other is Jagaddhatri. Jagaddhatri Puja is held exactly one month after Durga Puja. The main puja of Goddess Durga is on Shukla Ashtami of the month of Ashwin and that of Goddess Jagaddhatri on Shukla Navami of Kartik.

As the name suggests, Jagaddhatri is the nurse of the world. She is the guardian power of world civilization. She is another form of Goddess Durga. Therefore, in the prostration mantra of Jagaddhatri, she is praised as 'Durga'. Both goddesses are three-eyed and lion-armed. However, like Durga, Jagaddhatri is not ten-armed. She has conch, disc, bow and arrow in her four hands. She wears a snake on her neck. Her vehicle is an elephant under the lion. This elephant is actually Karindrasura, i.e. an elephant-shaped demon.

Jagaddhatri is the greatest of gods and goddesses. According to the mythological story, after the killing of Mahishasura by Mahamaya, the goddess of ten attacks, the gods became very arrogant. They thought that Goddess Durga was able to destroy the demon because she gave them weapons. They wanted to deny the power of Mahamaya. They forgot that they were powerful only by the power of the great power Jagaddhatri. To prove that ignorance wrong, the radiant Jagaddhatri appeared. Placing a piece of grass in front of her, she ordered the wind and fire to displace or burn it. But none of them could do it. Then the gods realized that their arrogance was in vain, they did not have the power of even a piece of grass. They all then accepted Goddess Jagaddhatri as the greatest of all powers. When the Goddess calmed down her radiance and assumed an unblemished form, everyone had a vision of the three-eyed, four-armed, blood-stained, snake-scented Jagaddhatri. Seeing that form of the auspicious Mahadevi, the gods sat in her praise.

Jagaddhatri is the best of the goddesses, which can be heard from the mouth of Thakur Ramakrishna. He said, ‘Do you know what the form of Jagaddhatri means? She is the one who holds the world. If she does not hold it, the world falls - is destroyed. Jagaddhatri arises in the heart of the one who can subdue the mind.’

A drunken elephant, on top of it is a lion, the symbol of power, and on top of it is the Goddess Jagaddhatri. She is the only one who can subdue the drunken mind of man. Our mind is always drunk like a drunken elephant. It is restless, insane. This fierce mind must be tamed by the ever-energetic lion of conscience, and must be subdued by the great power of the Goddess. When the mind is subdued, the great manifestation of the divine Jagaddhatri becomes easy in the heart.

According to the writers of the scriptures and myths, the one whom the lion-headed Jagaddhatri protects cannot fall or perish. In Bengal, this puja is mainly famous in Krishnanagar and Chandannagar. The puja of the birth place of Mother-Sardar in Jayarambati is also very famous. Many pujas are also performed in Bhadreshwar in Hooghly district, including Kolkata. Jagaddhatri puja is mainly performed on the Shukla Navami of the month of Kartik. However, in many places, separate pujas are performed on the seventh, eighth and ninth.

Jagadhatri Puja idol immersion procession in Chandannagar

Picture source: Google / Respective rightful owner