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Koda Festival
Koda festival or festival for making offerings to the divine
Mother is celebrated at the coastal village of Mandukkad in
Kanyakumari district for Bhagavati Amman. Devotees afflicated
with various maladies come here to pray as a last resort. They find
miraculous improvement here even though the best of medical attention has failed them before.
The Koda festival comes off in the Malayalam
month of Kumbam (Feb-March) ending with the last Tuesday of the month. Offerings include, rice, pepper,
jaggery, turmeric,
dolls, silver and wood pieces being replicas of parts of the body. On the
last day, the priest offers Odukka puja at mid night in an
atmosphere of pin-drop silence surcharged with devotion
and fear. A liquid made of lime, turmeric and other ingredients is
offered to the goddess.
Kumbabisheka
Kumbabisheka literally means the consecration or
dedication of a new temple or that of renovated one by pouring sanctified water
over the kumbams of Garbagraha tower and over the Kumbams of
the Rajagopura tower or Gateway tower. It is done on an auspicious day and it is a long
process with preliminary functions like setting the Yoga salas and
culminating in mandala abishekam.
Hindus believe that cosmos and all living things are
composed of the five elements - earths, water, fire, air and ether. Water
symbolises the life-force. The Kumbabishekam is the ritual relating
to water symbolism. Water from the holy rivers, collected at the
source by pious men in clean containers is kept in Kumbams or
decorated pitchers adorned with flowers and is worshipped in a
specially erected canopy, which is performed in the houses called Yagasala.
Mantras are recited to add to the spiritual power and to the sanctity
of the water. This ceremony signifies the consummation of the pious
endeavour of building the abode of the almighty.
Kumbabishekam is also an occasion for periodical
conservation of the sanctum sanctorum. To prevent oscillation and to fix
the idols security, the images and the peetas (bases on which they are placed)
are sealed together by means of Ashtabandhanam, a chemical compound
prepared by
mixing eight substances viz. kombarakku or wood loc, cukkann thol or lime
stone powder, kunkilium or konakai resin, karkaavi or red ochre, mezhugu or beeswax and
yerummai vennai or butter prepared out of buffalo's milk. The labourers
employed for mixing these components and preparing
the desired compound are expected to have purificatory baths before they
take up the work and to chant devotional hymns and utter the name of the
particular god to whose temple the Kumbabhishekam is to be performed.
A Kumbabishekam is very popular and people
from immediate neighbourhood go in groups with musical instruments,
alavattoms or multi-coloured flags representing in pictures
mythological scenes, giants-sized umbrellas and other temple
paraphernalia.
People travel many miles on foot,
on bullock cart or other
conveyance. Some of them carry head loads of cooked food or cooking
utensils, resting a while on river-beads or in choultries inns for
pilgrims. Attendance at Kumbabishekam is considered one of the
significant ways for invoking the blessing of god.
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