Festival Days : Last week of the month of December.

Festival Venue : Shantiniketan, Kolkata.

Festival Origins: Pous Mela has its origins in the year 1843. Maharishi Debendranath Tagore got converted and was formally announced as a Brahmo, towards the end of the year 1843. The years that followed saw more conversions, from Hindu to Brahmo faith. The Maharishi realized the grave problem of disintegration in the community and it was to organize this very particular community that a congregation was held on 7th December in the year 1845. The trust founded by the Maharishi carried on the mission and on 21st December, 1895 the first Pous Mela was held at Shantiniketan.

Celebrations: Pous Mela tries to bridge different communities, that exist in the state of West Bengal. The fair was marked with cultural intersection of various segments of the society, in the past. The line of demarcation between rural and urban population was not that prominent, in cultural terms, in the past. The fair was aimed to provide social interaction and discourses among various communities. As such it used to be more like a cultural activity, rather than fanfare and show biz. In its present form the fair is a large crowd puller who primarily come for merchandising goods and the entertainment of it. It is a session where rural masses and the urban business conglomerates exchange their point of view and more. There is a great display of consumer goods and items, a large crowd, and the rumble in the air.

Recent Practices: Despite the onslaught of the cultural values the fair still holds some of its primitive attributes. Every year the fair starts with the traditional morning prayers, normally at the campus of Visva Bharati University. The fair is visited by a whole genre of people, rural, urban, from different faiths and cross sections of the society. The popular Baul singers who in their songs provide the insights on mundane matters, students and teachers, artists and performers of dance and theatre, tourists and more flock in the region.