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Bhadrapad is an interesting time of the year, when the bright and dark fortnights are clearly marked in terms of auspicious beginnings and joyous festivities on the one hand, and onerous ritual responsibilities towards the ancestors on the other. This latter period is treated as inauspicious, being shunned for the start of new ventures, business or relationship commitments and celebrations.The rains continue, although the seas are calm and the seafarers are safely on voyage after a good few months’ gap on account of tempestuous seas and generally inclement weather. It is a slack season in farming, relatively speaking, as the crops grow with their own natural vigour, and the elements are kind to folk engaged in outdoors work.
In the villages, homes and environs are scrupulously cleaned. Walls are given a coat of whitewash and decorated with paintings by the resident artist, in readiness to welcome Honoured Guests. These are none other than the elephant-headed god Ganesh, along with his gentle Shaktis, Riddhi-Siddhi, preceded by goddess Parvati as the unmarried Hariyali or Hartalika. They will be later joined by the same Parvati, now as Ganesha’s mother- endearingly called Gauri - come home to her mother’s!
The Hartalika vrat (penance, commonly observed as dietary restraints or fasting) falls on the third bright lunar day in Bhadrapad. It is observed by married women as a mark of devotion to their husbands, and by unmarried girls in the hope of finding a righteous husband. In this, they seek to honour Parvati, unmarried daughter of the Himalayas, who undertook rigorous tapas (meditation and penance) to win the ascetic Shiva’s affections so that he would wed her. During this period she subsisted on nothing but green leaves, and so the women and girls observe strict fasting on this day.
The Ganesh festival starts on the bright fourth day of Bhadrapad, called Ganesh Chaturthi, and ends on the bright fourteenth day, called Anant Chaturdashi. Within this period, on Rishi Panchami occuring on the fifth lunar day (bright), the dietary fare follows the lifestyle of the sages, so that only grains, fruits and vegetables grown without ploughing the soil are cooked. It is also observed as a farming holiday. This symbolically nurtures respect for a non-invasive, eco-friendly lifestyle, whereby even worms and insects are not to be harmed in growing food for humans. Multipurpose medicinal leaves and twigs of the neem tree are used on this occasion to foster awareness of herbal resources for good health. Women undertake a vrat in honour of the sages, which includes fasting. They congregate for public bathing in the nearby streams or rivers in groups, singing devotional or folk songs and having fun in general.
This is followed by the coming of the Gauris. A stick topped with a beautiful Goddess mask made of clay and painted with natural dyes is carefully draped with a festive sari and jewellery, for worship as Ganesha’s mother. Women wear their best saris and jewellery to welcome her in their midst, with offerings of consecrated food and desserts, followed by singing and dancing late into the night in joyous celebration. At the end of the festivities, which may last from one-and-a-half to eleven days, the clay idols are carefully immersed in the water bodies nearby, with reminders to the Lord to soon return in the next year!
Anant Worship
Anant is the name of one of the ‘royal’ snakes of creation, born of Rishi Kashyap and his wife Kadru, daughter of Daksha. It is worshipped as the manifestation of Lord Vishnu, and many consider it to be the same as Shesha, the thousand-headed cobra, whose coils are the bed of Vishnu as he rests in the Kshirsagar - the Ocean of Bliss, his hoods forming a canopy over the Lord’s head.
Anant means endless or eternal; his coils are long enough to encircle the earth, and his hoods bear aloft the earth. Mythology ascribes to him a patient and dispassionate nature, and Sage Patanjali , the legendary founder of yoga is considered to be his incarnation, bringing to humanity the great science of cultivation of detachment, equipoise, rejuvenation and immortality.
In Karnataka especially, many households observe a sacred rite called the ‘Anant vow’. Special sweets are cooked, half of them being given away to Brahmins. A hooded cobra fashioned out of a species of grass called ‘darbha’, is placed inside a bamboo basket and worshipped. A silk string called ‘Anant’ is tied to the wrist. It has fourteen knots, and is coloured with vermillion powder. Women tie the string on their left hand and men on their right. The purpose of this vow is to obtain divinity and wealth, and it must be observed for fourteen years.
The Ecology of Spirit
The four-month period of Chaturmas continues, and most people observe ecologically sound dietary practices. In the previous month of Shravan in particular, many pious families abstain from eating fish, fowl and meat. The list of tamasic (creating dullness) foods includes onions and garlic, known to have a gross effect on the etheric body, with a corresponding sluggishness of the chakras. It is important that the chakras be attuned to higher spiritual vibes in the season of piety.
The practical aspect of these seasonal dietary adaptations relates to the dangers of bacterial infection in the overly wet period, when the Sun may be clouded over for weeks-on-end. There is fungal growth in the digestive tract, digestion is sluggish in general, with the fires in the belly damped down considerably, and so, eating foods difficult to digest is contrary to good health. Moreover, it is in the early part of this season that young ones have hatched in the seas and on the earth, and it is sound practice not to disturb the ecological balance by heedlessly killing their nurturing adults or the young ones.
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