Celebs Of B-town Celebrates Ganesh Chaturthi

Ganpati Bappa Moriya, Agle Baras Tu Jaldi Aa

Once again, the festival season is upon us and as Ganesh Chaturthi quickly approaches us, we are all preparing to welcome the Lord into our homes. Lord Ganesh is the God that symbolizes good luck, wisdom and fortune. He is known to be the destroyer of obstacles and is believed to help his true devotees in all new ventures in their lives. This year, the widely loved and celebrated festival comes a little earlier than usual on the 22^nd of August. Like all of us, so many celebrities of Bollywood too celebrate this festival with extreme enthusiasm and zest. Then what is it that intrigues us about their way of celebration” Afterall, the basic elements are boiled down to the same activities of Puja and Prasad.

The difference is in the way they celebrate the festival-

Last year, Shilpa Shetty Kundra, Dia Mirza and Arjun Kapoor all pledged to go eco-friendly in the way they celebrate the auspicious occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi. All of them realized the responsibility towards mother nature and actively chose to make the change and bring home an eco-friendly Bappa. When asked, Shilpa Shetty said that since she lives on the beach, it is heart breaking for her to see the numbers of Plaster of Paris Ganpati’s floating back to the shore after visarjan, which was one of the main reasons that drove her to make the change to an ecofriendly Ganpati. Another reason we admire celebrities celebrating festivals is because we get a rare chance to see them in their natural element while celebrating the occasions with their families. Last year, Shraddha Kapoor posted a picture wearing simple traditional attire, posing in front of her Ganpati Idol with her cousins. It is a refreshing change for all fans to see the actors in a different element than the televised version of them that we are used to seeing all the point. Shraddha Kapoor is also a practitioner of the ecofriendly way of celebrating Ganesh Chaturthi and also promotes buying eco-friendly idols. In 2018, when The Anushka Sharma and Varun Dhawan starrer film, Sui Dhaaga- Made in India was going to hit theatres, the lead actors shared a video to the Instagram accounts showing how eco-friendly Ganpati idols can be made. The idol was made by the entire team of Sui Dhaaga and was a biodegradable idol. Both actors promoted the importance of making and buying biodegradable idols and needless to say, the idol of Lord Ganesh did look every bit as enticing and beautiful as a regular Ganpati idol. This was a wonderful initiative taken up by the entire team to promote the importance of taking care of mother nature while celebrating such largescale festivals. Other reasons why we keep a track of celebrities celebrating festivals is the fact that festivals are a great opportunity for new work to be released. Like many film stars release films on Eid and Diwali, Ranveer Singh last year announced the launch of a new song by a 19-year-old rapper, KaamBhaari. The song was called Ganpati Aala Re and was produced by the actor’s record label Incink Records. The song was a great fit for the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi, and these are the kinds of announcements that make the ordinary people want to know what celebrities are up to during the festival season, especially the widely popular festivals. The biggest highlight of the B-town Ganesh Chaturthi celebration by far is the Ambani’s Ganpati bash. A large chunk of the industry is invited to the event and audiences and the media keep their eyes peeled to see who is visiting the bash and who isn’t. Last year, many celebrities showed up to the celebrations hosted by Mukesh and Nita Ambani and what mattered more than the attendance was what the guests were wearing. The traditional outfits that Bollywood celebrities wear during these events, set the tone for the fashion trends and choices people make throughout the rest of the year. Bollywood also has generations of people from the family carrying on traditions and naturally when the celebration of Ganesh Chaturthi was carried on from Raj Kapoor by his successors and heirs, the public attention went to what was happening with the “Kapoor’s Ganpati Celebrations”.  2019 especially was the end of an era for the Kapoor Khandaan as it was the last Ganesh Chaturthi, they celebrated at RK Studios. Due to a massive fire in the famous studio earlier in the year, the family decided to sell it off and the Ganesh Chaturthi would be the last that they celebrated there, thus putting an end to Raj Kapoor’s legacy. The studio had a massive ten-day celebration of Ganesh Chaturthi, where a section of the studio remained open for the public for darshan and Aarti in the morning and evenings. On the final day of the festival, Randhir Kapoor, Rishi Kapoor and Ranbir Kapoor came out to bid a final grand adieu to Bappa as it was the end of a tradition that had lasted on from the 70s. It is interesting for us being the common man to see what celebrities do, promote and wear during the festival season and it will for sure be interesting to know how B-town chooses to cope with the coronavirus and still manage to keep up the zeal of Ganesh Chaturthi this year, all while ensuring safety of themselves and others.