Who replaces the celebrities on hoardings during Durga Puja? A bigger celebrity, but not with a human body. It is the clay-bodied goddess herself. As the Durga Puja approaches, homely women in pressure-cooker advertisements acquire ten hands, each holding a different model of the cooker. Three formidable eyes stare out of every other hoarding — be it of a fairness cream or cement or cooking oil. Everyone wants a slice of her, and none can get enough.

If a survey on the brand value of Indian deities were to be conducted, our very own Durga stands the chance of acquiring a high rank. Among our 33 crore deities, the most worshipped ones are all likely to be good brand ambassadors. Yet, very few of them have been explored as a brand icon as profoundly as the three-eyed goddess; in Bengal, only Tagore can give her close competition.

The most innovative Durga Puja commercial this year was of a multinational soft drink company. The white silhouette of two bottles against a red background created the clever but deceptive image of the trishul, Durga’s trademark accessory. On the other hand, a biscuit company flashed heartwarming scenes on its hoardings — typical Bengali chat sessions which Durga and her four associate deities have joined in, with the stubborn caption: “Adda cholbe jotokkhon, thakur thakbe totokkhon (the goddess will stay as long as the chatting goes on)”.

A popular television channel seems to have done a cleverer job. In one of its hoardings, an idol-maker is busy decorating the goddess while she tells him, “Remote-ta dite bhulish na (don’t forget the remote).” A little more obvious was the ad by a steel-bar manufacturing company: it did not manage to get the goddess herself to feature in the ads, but borrowed some of her weapons to put in the hoardings and made them look suggestively steely.

Doesn’t all this affect Durga’s sanctity as a goddess, when she shares hoardings with mortals like perhaps Aishwarya Rai, endorsing products? At a glance, all this might seem to be a recent by-product of that all-pervasive monster, globalization. But in reality, the goddess and her festival have been used as a brand in Bengal much before ‘globalization’ entered the popular psyche. As early as 1930, the Eastern Bengal Railways had an advertising poster of “Pujoy Bhromon (Puja Travel)” with the image of a Bengali family walking with their luggage towards an approaching train through kaash fields. It is interesting that neither the goddess nor any part of her body or belongings features in this ad. The Durga Puja, here, is read not as a religious occasion but as a festive state of mind. Using this festive mood as an excuse to boost the sale of goods and services is an old practice. The three eyes, the ten hands, the trishul, the kaash are all symbols of this seasonal happiness.

After all, we have a natural claim on her. She belongs more in our drawing rooms, roadside decorations, magazine covers and pamphlets than on that faraway, exalted pedestal. She is more a family member than a goddess. Of course, she campaigns for our businesses, and we buy for her sake. And the best part is, she does not charge money for appearing in a commercial.