Skip to main content

Holika Dhahan



There is March already, we have some festival coming in next few days. Today here at Maharastra we celebrate a festival "Holika". And tomorrow it is Festival of Holi (Festival of colors). Although Holi is becoming very popular festival internationally and many people visit India just to enjoy holi, this post is not about Holi but its about Holika. Note the difference in the name.

I feel that all Indian festivals are designed so that people in society should gather and mix up with each other. Good news is its holiday tomorrow and its a long weekend. After long time I will be celebrating Holika. It is very interesting festival. Like all other Hindu festivals, it is about victory of good over bad. This time it is about victory of good within over the evil within us. On internet there are many stories how Holika started and so I will not discuss it here.

Indians believe that fire is pure. It burns evil and what remains is pure. Anything that survives fire is pure. We all know story of Sita from Ramayana. So during Holika, we set stack of cow dung cakes. In the evening many people from society gathers at one place, do the puja/archana and burn it. There is tradition of running around the fire and shout loudly. Shouting symbolize that if we have some complaints about something or somebody we say it and burn it, clear our mind for everybody and start over again. When I was kid, I and my cousins use to enjoy it so much. Its a official day for shouting and playing with fire. What else kids want. 😃 And there use to be a "Timki". It is a sort of drum specially made for Holika dhahan. During childhood we use to buy it and beat it like anything. We use to beat till either it breaks or till somebody use to shout us for the noise. This is the thing I really like.  Wow, I really miss those days. And this does not end here. There use to be sweet Chapati, Puran poli. Puran poli is sweet made specially on Holika. Many people in India don't know about this sweet food. I feel really sorry for them. They don't know what they are missing. My mother cooks it so well. She is the master in it. And guess what, she is here today and I am having it today. 

Today, Holika dhahan is performed at many places but the tradition is reducing. As far as environment is concerned it is better to keep it at low because Holika dahan causes pollution. So we need to create a balance. We want both. Traditional festivals should be alive and also environment should not get polluted. After-all life is about balance. I will try to upload photos if possible, till then enjoy..Happy Holika.






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Reality of Real Estate in India

Now days I do not happen to read news paper daily. Sometimes on weekends I get chance to read news papers. But, one thing I have noticed that first page or cover page, a page above front page which is full of property advertisement is reaching each home everyday. They have 1 BHK, 2BHK, 3BHK flats, row houses, farm houses, farm lands, and NA plots advertisement. Now days customers have hundreds of options. They have various budgets from so called cheap flats to luxurious flats with high budgets. They provide so many amenities. It’s a matter of research how many amenities are really needed and are used. They are present just as status symbols. People are paying so much money extra for these unused facilities.  I want to put my views here about whole real estate industry in India. Home is COSTLY (?) In India all businesses, industries, jobs are concentrated to few particular cities. I feel this is done deliberately to force people to stay, gather at one place. It is wel...
Post a Comment
Read more

Walkathon

Recently there was a two month long event happened in my workplace. Two month is too big for an event but it was great. It was a competition of walking or Walkathon. So?  what is great about walkathon?  It's common now a days and happens everywhere. Well, but it happened in my company, it was two months long and it was executed with help of digital technology (supporting Digital India Drive 😀) and most importantly I participated in it 😋 and no...I did not win :( but I participated and walked 5.5 Lacs steps, around 335 Kilometers. This may not be accurate, but even with 10% error, it will be 300 Kms. Wow. Winners completed around 15 Lacs steps and 900 Kms. It was organized by my company in cooperation with another fitness club. We used google fit for measuring steps. And one another application for teams formation, and statistics. Here is it how it happened... All the employees of the company were divided in 12 groups, one Capton was selected for each team. And competiti...
Post a Comment
Read more