Ma Durga's face is turned away from the supplicant Mahishasura as she looks benevolently towards another figure at her feet in a blue and white sari, hair tied in a bun. One of Durga's hands rests over her head in a gesture of benediction. Laxmi holds out paddy stalks, the symbol of prosperity, towards her. Sarasawati has her right arm outstretched to bless her too.

"We are not saying who the lady is. Let visitors figure out," general secretary of Bhowanipore Durgotsav Samity, Subhankar Roy Chowdhury, smiles cheekily. If the close resemblance does not give away her identity, the puja committee's theme, advertised in banners, leaves little to the imagination: Dekhbe ebar janata, pujor theme Mamata.

Mamata Banerjee's second coming as chief minister has prompted a slew of pujas in her backyard to celebrate her through their puja's theme.

New Alipore's Suruchi Sangha can claim to have shown the way. Minister Aroop Biswas has coaxed the chief minister to write 12 lines on universal brotherhood, four of which are being flaunted on hoardings across the city. "It is a rare honour," says Swarup Biswas, the minister's brother and the puja's general secretary.

The lines have been set to tune for the puja's theme song by composer Jeet Ganguli. "We are the only puja to have its theme song written by the chief minister. This is the second year that she is doing it. She has been inaugurating our puja for 16-17 years now," preens Swarup.

Lacking access to Mamata, Bhowanipore Swadhin Sangha is using the second best option by choosing one of her published poems. "We looked up six of her collections before we could zero in on a piece. The process took months as the approval had to come from the leaders," says Subrata Dey, the pandal designer.

Swadhin Sangha's chief advisor is Mamata's brother Kartick Banerjee while the local councillor Ashim Bose is its general secretary. The chosen piece, titled Sonar Bangla, speaks of a Bengal of her dreams that would be "unnayaner ghnati" (a hub of development) and " sonar cheyeo khnati" (purer than gold).

"The puja is not about Mamata, the politician, but about Mamata, the poet, or rather Mamata, the philosopher," says member Partha Dutta, showing around the pandal where a 10-armed rural woman reappears on the walls after every scene. "We are depicting Durga as Lokjanani (Mother of the populace)."

The chief minister had inaugurated the puja for the first time in 2015 and the organisers are certain of her return to do the honours.

The youngsters of Batam Club who are organising the small-budget Peyarabagan Sarbojanin puja opposite the PVD office at Beltala are also hoping to catch the chief minister's eye with their theme of Biswa Bangla. The globe that she has designed as the logo of brand Bengal will be the centrepiece over the entry into the pandal. "Inside, on one side would be showcased her urban projects like trident lamps, renovation of Indrapuri Studio and Nabanna, and on the other the projects targeted at rural Bengal like Kanyashree and Sabuj Sathi," treasurer Sujoy Chakraborty says.

"We are doing all this to please Didi," adds club member Amit Das unabashedly. The boys, barely out of their teens. have sent an invitation to Nabanna.

Bhowanipore Durgotsav Samity will also highlight her projects besides displaying milestones of her life. "We have gathered pictures of her college days, the Hazra Road attack, her Singur fast etc leading up to her second swearing-in. This generation has not seen her struggle," Roy Chowdhury says.

Poles will be erected all along the pavements carrying pictures of Mamata with other dignitaries, from Amitabh Bachchan to Imran Khan to Mahasweta Devi. The theme song of Safe Drive, Save Live, the chief minister's brainchild, will play on the pandal audio system.

While Suruchi Sangha is a proven crowd-puller, the others are hoping to draw footfall by playing the Mamata card. "We have already been featured in Jago Bangla (the Trinamul mouthpiece). The Bhowanipore police station has asked us to keep more volunteers ready for crowd control. When word spreads about our theme, even rural people would want to see our puja. Everyone loves Didi," grins Dutta.

"Why just her fans, even critics would come to our puja in search of faults," points out Roy Chowdhury. This awareness is what has led the idol's sculptor Kamal Biswas to sound a warning. "Everyone might not like to see a human being in the same frame in which Durga is being worshipped. So I have asked the boys to buy a mini idol to place in front of this and worship that instead," says the veteran idol maker from Keshpur.