Festivals dispel the tedium of everyday living.
Here is a brief account of the significance of
various festivals celebrated in India.

By Nirmala M. Patel

What would life be like if there were no festivals at all? To break the monotony of the daily humdrum and to bring new zest and enthusiasm, festivals are a necessity. Observing them instills a sense of values in children.

Life nowadays has become so mechanical—what with both parents working and too tired to bother with tradition, the children (and the adults) mostly find consolation and company in a TV set. Indian festivals have a socio-religious significance and the necessity to observe them is more pronounced now than ever before.

The very word festival has a joyous ring around it and a fantastic charm—due mainly to the association of ideas and the memories a particular festive occasion evokes.

To begin at the beginning, the first festival—the New Year’s day—be it according to the lunar calendar or the solar one—is a mixture of subdued gaiety, fervent prayer, ardent wishing and, yes, a wee bit of fear, too, about what the year being ushered in holds for you.

Each community and each State has its own customs for the day which includes wearing new clothes, seeing the family shrine decorated with flowers and an offering of fruits and sweets the first thing in the morning, visiting a temple, paying respects to elders, religiously reading the new almanac and all the prophecies for the year about the weather, trade and agriculture and all the rest of it.

In most households, they cook something sour, something sweet, something bitter and something hot. Every member is expected to taste all the 4 dishes—to symbolically assure themselves that they have gone through the entire gamut of human experience. For those who observe Ram Navami, the birthday of Sri Ramachandra, the 8 days preceding it are also days of celebration — mass singing of bhajans and other religious observances. And the lunar New Year’s day happens to be the first day of this set of 9 days. That way, too, the New Year’s day is more a day of somber religious fervour than one of gay abandon.
The full moon day in the month of Ashad happens to be the birthday of the Adi Guru, sage Veda Vyas. He is believed to be Lord Vishnu incarnate, who descended on earth at the request of Lord Brahma to save the Vedas from sinking into oblivion. It is celebrated as Guru Purnima in honour and veneration of the Adi Guru (the first teacher) by students, sanyasis and spiritual aspirants all over the country.

Next comes the colourful month of Shravan, when Mother Earth is at her best and freshest, at her loveliest and grandest. With the month-long, south-west monsoon having washed away all the summer dust and dirt, with plants and trees presenting a sparkling green picture. The gardens are full of flowers, while wild plants and ferns cover every inch of even waste-land. The compound-walls too are covered with velvety green moss and the countryside appears breathtakingly beautiful.

The unpredictable Shravan weather—bright this moment, overcast the next, light showers the third, a delightful mixture of sunshine and drizzle the fourth—adds charm to life. To the teasingly playful weather and the bewitchingly gorgeous countryside there is a glorious finishing touch—the rainbow, now here, now there, now nowhere and again spanning the entire heavens.

Truly, Shravan is the magical month in the Indian calendar. It rightly deserves the maximum number of festivals that it has.

First comes Nag-Panchami, when cobras are worshipped and offered milk. Love your enemy—that is the message of this first festival of Shravan. Even a poisonous creature like the cobra turns docile and harmless when offered milk. Will not the milk of human kindness and friendship change the venom. of hatred?

The full-moon day of Shravan is a day of re-dedication to one’s principles and family obligations. At his upanayanam a boy gets his first sacred thread. Its 3 strands are for the 3 vows he takes then and renews each time the sacred thread is changed—to be right and pure in thought, word and deed.

At the time of his marriage, his bride’s father gives him one more sacred thread—this time the same 3 vows are on behalf of his wife. Before changing the thread, the head of the family offers oblations to all his ancestors.

The bond of brother-sister relation ship is strengthened each year when the sister ties a rakhi on her brother’ wrist on the full moon day of Shravan; for this day is Raksha Bandhan day, too.

Janmashtami

Sri Krishna Janmashtami comes days later. It is the birthday of the most beloved and multi-faceted poorna avatar, whose life and doing right from infancy have held humanity spell-bound. Like Jesus Christ, Sri Krishna was born during the dark hours after midnight.

Janmashtami eve is observed with vrit (fasting), prayers and puja. The day following is one of gaiety an, rejoicing everywhere—inside the house and temple and out on the streets, too.

As if these festivals in one single month were not enough, Saraswat and Gowd Saraswath women collect all the various flowers, cultivated an wild, including those from weed arrange them into little bunches with bits of greenery and offer them not to the Creator, mind you, but to a plant —tulsi, the sacred basil.

This act of adoration to Mother Nature is performed on all Friday and Sundays of Shravan. The second Friday of Shravan is Vara Mahalakshmi puja, when the wish fulfilling goddess of wealth an prosperity is worshipped.

Eleven days after Janmashtami, on the third day of the bright fortnight goddess Gowri along with her husband, Mahadev, visits her parental home. King Parvataraja’s wife, overjoyed at seeing her daughter and son-in-law, forgot to put salt in 3 of the items on the menu. These particular dishes are still offered to goddess Gowri without salt.

Next day is Ganesh Chaturthi. Among all deities, Ganeshji combines within himself the physical might of the strongest of the animal species, the elephant, with the intellect of the human species. In that case, it should have been a human head on an elephant body!

As it is, Ganeshji has the largest ears among all the gods and thus hears everything. He listens to everyone’s prayers and grants them; he removes all obstacles and clears the way for everyone.
As far as talking is concerned, mum is the word. That would not have been the case if he had a human head on an elephant body! He would have talked endlessly and would not had the time to listen to anyone, let alone grant boons.
He rides a rat and is in full control over it. He has a cobra round his rotund abdomen—which ensures that the rat dare not misbehave. It is the rat, among all pests, which destroys food grains most.

Ganeshji is the god, whose blessing all clans and sects invoke to pave the way and ensure success for any new project. Why, the word “Sri Ganesh” means the muhurth for starting anything new.

By this time of the year, all human efforts have been put in to ensure successful crop— the fields ploughed, the seeds sown and the seedlings transplanted. The plants are almost full grown and have started putting forth sprigs of sheaves. All the farmer and the landlord can do now is pray that the small grain grow and start thickening. And, of course, wait.
So, 10 days after Ganesh Chaturthi, Anant Chaturdashi is observed. Everyone prays that the milky juice in the paddy grains may fill unendingly —an-ant (without an end).

Right on the heels of this festival of endlessness comes the pitra-paksha (pitra=ancestors, paksha=fortnight) the Mahalaya fortnight. At least once a year, on any one day of this fortnight, one’s ancestors are remembered with reverence and offered oblations.

Mahalaya Amavasya ushers in Navratri, the second set of 9 days of continuous celebration. The first set ended with Sri Ramachandra’s birth. This second precedes his killing of the demon-king, Ravan.

Navratri, observed specially for the worship of the Nav-Durgas, is harvest time, too, in some States— Karnataka for one. In grateful reverence for the bountiful harvest, the Mother Goddess is worshipped in all Her various forms.

With the harvest safely home, the mood of jubilation continues. So does the mood of joyful introspection —as one sows, so one reaps; the fruits of one’s labour are garnered. If you sow the wind, then you have to reap the whirlwind, as the demons Ravan and Mahisha had to during Dussehra and Narakasur during Diwali. It is the triumph of good over evil. Also, you do your work and collect reward.

Ayudha-puja on the final day of Navratri is a very beautiful custom. Offering worship to whatever tools, instruments, machines and other implements, vehicles, books etc one uses daily at least once a year keeps alive the spirit of respect and care of one’s things.

The next day, Vijaya Dasami, is the appropriate and auspicious muhurth to start a child’s scholastic studies. Many schools admit children in the first class even though the academic year starts much later.

It is lamps, lamps, lamps

By Diwali, the monsoon is almost over. Cold, dry weather sets in. And a good oil bath is a must. It is symbolic of Sri Krishna killing the demon Narakasur. Narakasur means the demon of dirt. How does one get rid of dirt? By an oil-bath, of course.

With the granaries full, the need to share the fruits of months of labour during the monsoon arises. It is only natural. New clothes, gifts and sweets for the family and friends, for the dependents and well-wishers are called for.

Days are becoming shorter Darkness sets in early—much earlier than it did a month or 2 ago. So, why not have a festival of lights.
It is lamps, lamps and lamps—of all sorts, from the humble earthen diya to silver kuthuvilakku to fabulous Chinese lanterns with long streamer. The lights are everywhere — homes and shops, in temples and offices—rows upon rows of them, in endless tiers starting from Diwali to right up to the Kartik Purnima.

The Diwali new moon night is puja night for Goddess Kali, the beautiful, blue-coloured deity, clad only in a garland of severed heads and a girdle of arms.

In mid-January the sun reaches the Equator on its northward journey. Makar Sankranti, as it is called, is a great day as Uttarayana starts from it Different communities and different States have their own individual customs. In Tamil Nadu it is harvest time and Pongal (named after a rice preparation) is celebrated in a traditional and grand manner for 3 consecutive days.

In keeping with the asceticism of the great god Maheshwar, Shivratri, a couple of months later, is an austere observance. People fast and spend a whole 24 hours in prayer and wakefulness.

Winter is packing off. Spring is round the corner. That is the juncture of the colourful Holi, a quaint mixture of austerity and gaiety. Shiv is believed to have opened his third eye and burnt Kamadev, the Indian equivalent of Cupid, to ashes on the Holi day.

Symbolically, merrymakers make a bonfire of whatever old furniture and wooden materials the households leave at the doorstep. In celebration of the end of the cold winter and the arrival of festive spring, people spray coloured water and smear each other with powders of all hues. They literally paint the whole town and the entire countryside with all the .colours of the rainbow.

Appropriately, the festival of colours is the last festival of the year. A colourful end to the year. And then on to the next new year—how will that turn out to be?