Mail News Service
Jamshedpur, Nov 9: The festive spirit has not ebbed away and this is very much pertinent as people make a recce of the big and not-so-big market places in Jamshedpur.
The huge, unyielding crowds have made it a point of not letting initial winter to take its bite. Just like sunrise at midnight, traces of perspiration mark faces jostling and pushing for space on market streets and in shops. The atmosphere is that of frenzy.
Jewelry and household utensil shops are traditional zones of Dhanteras purchases.
This year, the vehicle market is flexing its ‘luring muscles’ with many opting for two-wheeler and four-wheeler vehicles. May be banks and other financial institutions too are doing brisk business by extending attractive loan rates for people to live their ‘vehicular’ dreams.
This almost new Dhanteras trend has seen many customers booking their vehicles in advance to ensure delivery on Friday, November 10, the big Dhanteras day.
Another rush that has remained traditional is marked along the Sakchi-Bhalubasa road.
The Kumhars (Potters) whose stalls line the side of this road along Baradwari and Kumhar Para throughout the year, are crowded during Dhanteras, Kali Puja and Diwali times with people purchasing clay lamps of varied shapes, deigns and colours including, of course, the traditional ones that have brightened the aura of festivities through centuries.
One gets to see and pick from a variety of clay-lamp designs, coloured or simple, clay houses that have, with time, transformed into clay miniatures of huts, simple single storey dwellings, multi storied residential blocks, duplex cottages and palatial buildings.
This is one festive phase when these clay artists find the solace of burning clay lamps in their own homes.
This is one time when the blessings of Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Ganesh warm and brighten the Kumhars’ hearths and homes.
On Thursday, the eve of Dhanteras, the roads were choc-a-bloc with men and machines on ‘congestion drive’ eager to add to the crowds of Dhanteras and Diwali purchasers at various markets. The crowds started growing a couple of hours before midday and the traffic naturally, inflated to maniacal proportions and remained thus till near midnight. The crowded streets and market places and traffic bottlenecks are bound to spill over to Friday with people out to fulfil their auspicious Dhanteras buying spree. That is the essence of new purchases, new Dhanteras and renewed blessings on the occasion.