H1N1 shadow on Ganesh festival

“This year all the big mandals have brought down their spending to 20 per cent,” said Anand Saraf,who has done a lot of research on Ganesh festival in Pune. “Besides swine flu,inflation and recession are also major reasons for cost cutting,” he added.

Agrees Shyam Mankar,president of Hatti Ganpati Mandal. “We generally spend around Rs 10 lakh for the festival. This time it will come down to around Rs 2 lakh as we will not erect the sets,” he said. With no sets coming up,the pandal makers are affected. According to B S Kature of Kature Mandapwale,the firm will face a loss of around Rs 10 lakh this year. “We make pandals for at least 30 mandals. This time,however,we have only 15 orders. Each pandal costs around Rs 60,000 with some big ones even going up to around Rs 1 lakh. Now,we have lost almost 50 per cent of our business,” he said.

Then there are the decorators. “Most decorators had started preparing for the festival since the last two months. The orders were also placed. However,cancellation at the eleventh hour has marred the business with the total business coming down by 50 per cent,” said Vijay Dixit,who is in the business for the last 30 years.

With the big mandals toning down the festival,the advertisers also went on back foot cancelling sponsorships. “The obvious reason is lower turnout compared to the previous expectations,” said Saraf.

Housing societies upbeat
Even as sarvajanik mandals have toned down the festival,households are ready as usual to welcome Lord Ganesh. According to an estimate,Ganesh idols will be installed in 2 lakh homes in the city. Around 15,000 housing societies celebrate the festival and there have been no news of any cancellation there,as limited people gather in the societies.