Bengaluru Marathi groups prepare for Ganesh Chaturthi

Pooja Sonawane Joshi has watched Mahanaad Dhol Tasha Pathak Bangalore grow from five dhols and 20 drummers in 2023 to more than 30 dhols and 100 performers. Its members range in age from 12 to over 60, and many are not Marathi speakers.

The group is part of Maharashtra Mandal Bengaluru and will perform during Ganesh Chaturthi, the mandal’s largest annual event. The festival runs for more than a week and is open to all.

A Gandhi Nagar association

Maharashtra Mandal Bengaluru says it was established in 1920. Its first-meeting minutes have been preserved, said Joshi, the mandal’s secretary. The erstwhile Maharaja of Wodeyar gifted the organisation a plot in Gandhi Nagar, she said, where it now has a building with an auditorium, library and guest rooms.

Other associations formed as Marathi-speaking residents spread across Bengaluru. Mitra Mandal Bangalore began about 40 years ago in Indiranagar, founded by Pushpa and Sharad Dravid, Kumud and Harish Rajankar, Satish Kothari and others. Alongside Ganesh Chaturthi, it holds performances, competitions and local festival events through the year.

One of its traditions is Bhondala, a folk game observed during Hasta Nakshatra. Participants try to identify who brought the prasad for the potluck. The group also organises an annual picnic attended by as many as 60 people and publishes a yearbook that records milestones and recognises community contributions.

Networks beyond the festival calendar

The Bengaluru Marathi Welfare Association, launched in 2011 as a small cultural platform, now also convenes an entrepreneurial network. Its monthly meetings include more than 100 entrepreneurs and professionals, from fruit sellers and travel agents to doctors and chartered accountants. The meetings are open to non-Marathi businesspeople and are intended to connect students and new professionals with established residents.

Omkar Ashok Muravane, the association’s president, said the groups were created to help people arriving in Bengaluru find others from their hometowns. “If Bengaluru did not support us, we wouldn’t have become what we are today,” he said.

Former Mitra Mandal Bangalore president Sanjeev Keskar said the IT boom of the 1990s brought many Marathi professionals to Karnataka. As new layouts and apartment complexes expanded farther from the city centre, smaller resident groups followed.

Maharashtra Mandal’s Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations and Mahanaad Dhol Tasha Pathak performances are open to the public.