{"id":7672,"date":"2020-07-20T11:00:11","date_gmt":"2020-07-20T11:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/?p=7672"},"modified":"2020-07-20T11:00:11","modified_gmt":"2020-07-20T11:00:11","slug":"priests-in-kolkata-hit-hard-as-income-dries-up-amid-covid-19-crisis-kolkata-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/?p=7672","title":{"rendered":"Priests in Kolkata hit hard as income dries up amid Covid-19 crisis | Kolkata News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>KOLKATA: With several weddings and religious functions being put on hold due to the Covid-19 <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/pandemic\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" data-ga=\"within_article-topic_link|topic_pandemic\" frmappuse=\"1\">pandemic<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/many-Hindu-priests\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" data-ga=\"within_article-topic_link|topic_many-Hindu-priests\" frmappuse=\"1\">many Hindu priests<\/a> in Kolkata and its vicinity are in dire straits, some even looking for an alternative source of income to make ends meet. <br \/>Sushanta Chakraborty, a priest in <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/Agarpara\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" data-ga=\"within_article-topic_link|topic_Agarpara\" frmappuse=\"1\">Agarpara<\/a> on the northern outskirts of the city, is selling vegetables in his locality, something that he said his &#8220;ancestors couldn&#8217;t have thought of, no matter what the circumstances&#8221;. <br \/>&#8220;Some households which I had been visiting for decades to perform rituals on auspicious occasions wouldn&#8217;t invite me anymore. Since March, I have been sitting idle. With four mouths to feed &#8212; my aged parents, daughter and wife &#8212; I finally decided to sell vegetables on a cart. <br \/>&#8220;Before March, I used to earn anything between Rs 35,000 and Rs 40,000 every month. Now, I barely manage to take home Rs 800 per day,&#8221; Chakraborty said. <br \/>Vijay Upadhay, a priest in the city&#8217;s Kestopur area, has taken to Facebook to urge people that they be allowed to perform household rituals. <br \/>&#8220;Narayan puja rituals are now taking place without the presence of a priest in many households. I appeal to all of you to remove the misgivings and allow priests conduct the rituals,&#8221; he said. <br \/>Vinod Jha, a committee member of a Hanuman temple in Kamarhati, said the management has decided to retain just one of the three priests on its payroll. <br \/>&#8220;The number of devotees has declined and so have the earnings. We have decided to let go of two priests and retain only one for performing the daily rituals,&#8221; Jha said. <br \/>Montu Chakroborty, a priest in south Kolkata&#8217;s Chakraberia area, believes that the situation will change for better during <a href=\"http:\/\/www.speakingtree.in\/topics\/beliefs\/durga-puja\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" data-ga=\"within_article-topic_link|topic_http:\/\/www.speakingtree.in\/topics\/beliefs\/durga-puja\" rel=\"noopener nofollow noreferrer\" frmappuse=\"1\">Durga puja<\/a>. <br \/>&#8220;Some Durga puja committees have assured me that they would invite me. I am pinning my hopes on them. My earnings per month have come down to Rs 6,000 from Rs 11,000. But I know Maa (Durga) will set things right,&#8221; he said. <\/div>\n<p><a href=\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/city\/kolkata\/priests-in-kolkata-hit-hard-as-income-dries-up-amid-covid-19-crisis\/articleshow\/77065487.cms\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>KOLKATA: With several weddings and religious functions being put on hold due to the Covid-19 pandemic, many Hindu priests in Kolkata and its vicinity are in dire straits, some even looking for an alternative source of income to make ends meet. Sushanta Chakraborty, a priest in Agarpara on the northern [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7673,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kolkata"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/1595242816_photo.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bengalnewstimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}