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The end of winter is heralded by the festival of
Sri-Panchami,
i.e. the Vasant-Panchami held almost all over India on a date between the last week of January and
the middle of February. The day is sacred to Saraswati, goddess of learning whose
worship is celebrated with great splendour by students and artists. Girl worshipers
wear cloth, dyed saffron the traditional colour of spring. In the evening, cultural
functions where music and recitations of poems,
dramatic performances and dances are held. A vegetarian feast with luchi
(thin fried cakes of wheaten flour) is the order of the day.
Rathayathra
Some of the many festivals of Vaishnavite character have become popular
and these festivals are observed by all sections of Hindus. One of these is the
Rathayathra festival held on the second day after the new moon in the
early rainy season. An image of Vishnu in the form of Jagannath (Lord of
Universe) is placed in a wooden chariot built in the shape of a temple on
wheels, which is drawn by men of all castes to an appointed place. The day is
considered very auspicious, marking as it does the start of the sowing season
for the monsoon crop, throughout eastern India. The festival is observed in towns
and villages. A special feature of fairs held on the occasion is the brisk sales
of seeds and seedlings to farmers and gardeners. The festival at Mahesh a few
miles from Calcutta on the west bank of the river Hooghly, attracts lakhs of people.
Holi
The
Holi festival
is held on a full-moon day in early spring. This spring carnival
in which men and women delight in daubing one another with colours especially red, has been associated
with the Krishna legend and has some to acquire on esoteric significance with the
elite, particularly with Vaishnavas who solemnly observe the day as the Birthday
of Chaitanya.
Orthodox Vaishnava festivals
Orthodox Vaishnava festivals like Ras Purnima
celebrated in the late autumn, Jhulan
Purnima and Janmashtami celebrated in mid-monsoon, Dhulat
Purnima in late winter are held at Nabadiwip and all seats of Vaishnava saints.
These festivals draw a large assemblies of the devout. The programmes include ceremonial
worship of Krishna-Radha, Kirtan, Sankirtan ( choral incantation of the
names of Hari, Krishna, Rama, Sri Chaitanya and his immediate disciples) and
communal feeding.
Festival
of Sahajiya Sect
The Sahajiya sect has its biggest festival in the middle of January at
Kenduli in Birbhum district. The district is the birth place of Jayadeva, the poet of Gita
Govindam. Here, Sahajiyas from all parts of Bengal assemble in a week long
festival, hold long sessions of highly exoteric songs and ecstatic dance and go
through their characteristic forms of worship. The village and the environs are
transformed into a vast fair ground, where every article of use and inexpensive
finery are brought and sold and popular entertainments do brisk business.
A similar mela, is held at Ghosepara, near Kalyani on the day following Holi.
The
river Ganga accounts for one of the great festivals-cum-fair. On the last day
of Indian month of Pous (Mid January) lakhs of assembled pilgrims
have a holy dip at the Saugour island beach on the estuary of the Bhagirathi
river, where a makeshift township is erected for their reception by the state authorities. The pilgrims who belong to all sections of
Hindus flock by river crafts of all descriptions. Complete bazars (markets) springs up for meeting their
needs. Medical including hospital facilities are made available and Hindu
missionary bodies provide thousands of volunteers to look after their welfare.
Dussera
Another occasion for the worship
of the Ganga is the Dussera festival in mid-summer. All along the banks of the
Bhagirathi, people take ceremonial
baths in the river, offer worship to mother Ganga and distribute alms to
beggars, supposedly to earn a bonus of religious merit.
Siva, admitted to the Hindu pantheon as Mahadeva or god of gods accounts for
the festival of Sivarathri . On a new moon night in February-March,
thousands and
thousands of pilgrims assemble at the principle Siva temples. The temple at
Tarakeshwar in Hooghly district attracts lakhs of pilgrims and a fair with all
its features spring up. Siva, in the form of Neel (Nilakantha or blue throated )
is the object of a month-long celebration of sections of the scheduled
castes, particularly the section of tribals who have settled in non-tribal
areas and those in 'unclean' occupations, which come to a climax on the last day
of the Bengali year when ecstatic devotees of Siva throw themselves on
specially prepared planks studded with sharp nails and hang suspended on a
cross bar tied atop a pole by the skin of their back, which has been pierced
through, by a skewer. This is the Charhak festival which invariably draws
thousands of spectators to the awe-inspiring scene of incredible acts of
self-mortification, a surviving remnant of degenerate Tantric practices.
People of upper castes especially women, observe complete fasts on the day and
offer worship to Siva. Fairs are invariably held on the occasion in towns and
villages, where toys and other handiwork of artisans are put up for sale.
The participants take out teams of clowns in farcical dresses, chanting rugged
doggerels in criticism of current fashions and events.
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