The Reminiscence of Mahalaya...

On this auspicious morning of Mahalaya (the coming of Devi Durga on earth), I woke up at 4, following my age old ritual, since the  time I am able to recollect. Yes, since school days it has become a habit to get up around 4 on this morning and listen to the broadcast of All India Radio that was still quite popular during the late 90s...although the use of radio was slowly but gradually coming to a halt after decades and decades of its innumerable usage, from daily news to live commentary of cricket matches, including the immortal broadcast of India's first emphatic world cup win in the 1983 cricket world cup.           Those days tv sets were a rarity and the majority were glued to their radio sets and listening was all could be enjoyed...still there was a different delight, a different excitement to all these. I remember my Bhaiyya (my grandfather) getting up early and exactly on time and gearing up, to listen to the Mahalaya programme, tuning his very possessive Philips radio. And I remember waking up a few minutes after Bhaiyya turned the programme on...Shri Birendra Krishna Bhadra's immortal voice used to give goosebumps, although I could hardly decipher the meaning of the mantras chanted then, but the voice itself used to give jitters and yes it still does...yes with the advent of new technology, devices our daily lives had drastically changed and yes am a part of that change, but  the old charm sometimes seems to be missing. Even today I woke up early and like every year tuned into my tv and viewed several Bangla channels.  But honestly there was something missing and guess what technology came into my rescue. I logged into internet and had my share of the Mahalaya chanted in the eternal voice of the legendary voice of Shri Birendra Krishna Bhadra in you tube...yes may be in today's date using Internet is no big deal but surely a decade ago or so I would never imagined the radio being replaced by You tube to this extent that I would be using this someday to listen to the Mahalaya programme...

"Om Sarvomangallo Shivey Sharvartha Shadikey
Sharney thrambakey gauri narayani nomosthuthey..."