HYDERABAD, INDIA, August 3, 2006: Ganesha Chaturthi is around the corner and Hyderabad is flooded with Ganesha icons of all sizes. This year items that go into making the icons have become costly. The 10-foot icon for example will cost US$150.00 which is around 20 percent more than last year. “We would get powder, plaster-of-paris, kerosene for cheap earlier. But this year rates of these commodities have doubled. So, we ourselves are borrowing money to make them,” said Raju, an artisan. Thousands of avatars of the Elephant God are getting ready on the highway leading to Vijayawada, one of the centers that supplies icons to Hyderabad and elsewhere. Over 1,000 artisans are working overtime from dawn to dusk. By the end of next week, all the icons will be painted and ready for the devotees to purchase them. People usually buy three or four days ahead of Ganesha Chaturthi. The artisans say 90 percent of their icons get sold. The festival begins in the last week of August. Once the festival is over, these artisans turn to other vocations before Lord Ganesha comes visiting again next year.
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