In a brilliant display of his creativity, an artist from Dhubri has used expired medicine like tablets, capsules and injection vials to make the idol of Goddess Durga.
Today (Friday) is Saptami of the Durga Puja festival and Dhubri is also celebrating the festival amid the Covid19 pandemic.
Sanjib Basak, the artisan, who is an employee of the Dhubri district administration, said this year he had less time to come up with new ideas but finally decided to create his magic out of trash.
However, at a time when the government and the district administration has urged the people and puja committees to celebrate the festival in a simple way amid the Coronavirus pandemic, making idols out of waste did not find any takers.
Sharing his inspirations behind the idol, Basak said, “This time as the entire nation was following tight COVID19 protocols, it took me nearly five months to complete the idols. Around 40,000 strips of tablets, capsules and injection vials of different colours have been used to build the idol.”
The idol is 6 feet in height.
“During the lockdown period, I saw people buying different types of essential medicines and storing the same in large-scale, and then I thought to create a unique idol made only of expired medicines to mark this worldwide pandemic in my design,” added Basak.
He said paper, thermocol and board have been used to fix the medicine strips to create the idol.
“I have used the strips of medicine covers and shape it and stuff it with thermocols and papers to make the main structure,” said Basak.
Basak, a resident of ward 3 of Dhubri town, has become popular for making idols of gods and goddesses in innovative and eco-friendly ways for the last couple of years.
Last year, he made Durga idol with unused electric wires while in 2018 he made an idol with matchsticks in which more than 1.75 lakh matchsticks were used.
