PIROJPUR — A century-old chitoi pitha festival drew thousands of people to a Kali temple in Pirojpur’s Nazirpur upazila on Saturday, with women cooking the traditional rice cakes on 108 clay stoves in what has grown into a popular folk celebration.
Through the winter fog, smoke from the clay stoves and the warm aroma of fresh pitha filled the temple grounds. Despite the biting cold, visitors came from across the country to take part in the festival.
The event, held Saturday, Jan. 24, at the Kali temple on Deblal Chakraborty’s property near Kumarkhali bazaar in the upazila’s sadar union, runs from evening until Monday morning, Jan. 19. What began as a religious ritual has, over the years, evolved into a public celebration.
Organizers had arranged 108 clay stoves in a row, each topped with traditional clay baking dishes. Women from various regions worked at preparing the rice-flour pitha. As evening fell, the crowds grew — devotees, those with personal vows to keep, and simple onlookers. Many brought their own rice flour, firewood and bamboo.
Around 7 p.m., priest Deblal Chakraborty began reciting mantras to formally open the festival. He lit the fires beneath each stove, and the women began making pitha. After being lifted from the baking dishes, the cakes were gathered in large vessels, offered to the temple’s deity, and then distributed as prasad to all present. Those who came to fulfill vows received pitha by hand.
“I used to come with my mother as a child,” said Sumitra Rani Das, a worshipper from Barishal. “I married and moved far away, but this day still pulls at my heart. The pitha here feels tied to my childhood.”
Shyama Pal, who had visited the previous year hoping to bear a child, returned this year with an infant in her arms to make pitha. “For a long time I had no children. Last year I came here and made a vow. Within a month I had good news. This year I came to make pitha with my child.”
“We used to hear it was just a vow ritual,” said local resident Rahul Bishwas. “Now it’s the biggest festival in our area. People come to celebrate across religious lines.”
A Muslim woman who declined to be named said she came in hopes of fulfilling a wish. “I came because I haven’t been able to have a child. A place built on people’s faith and love is open to everyone, so I came.”
Deblal Chakraborty has served as the temple’s priest since 1986, continuing a family tradition. “Ninety-two years ago, our ancestor Harshit Ananda Chakraborty would organize a fair at this Kali temple courtyard on the new moon of the month of Magh,” he said. “There was a tradition of eating dry food on that day. Following that tradition, the practice of making chitoi pitha at the temple and offering it as prasad began. People accepted the pitha hoping to fulfill their wishes, and the practice has continued through generations. As the number of worshippers has grown, the pitha-making has gradually grown into this large festival.”
What grew over a century of continuity is no longer merely religious, residents said. It has become a universal folk festival of Nazirpur, sustained by faith, tradition and the gathering of people.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report