LakSquare-Lifestyle Magazine
Bihu — Welcoming the New Year
Rongali Bihu or Bohag Bihu falls on the same day as our Tamil New Years Day in mid-April. It is one of the most important festivals in Assam, what with the well known Bihu dance , and is said to be a week long celebration. This year (2021) Bihu was on April 14. A few days earlier itself the markets, shopping centres etc. at Guwahati was chock-a-block with people indulging in festival purchases, that traffic was crawling. It was as if people just wanted to forget about the pandemic and have a good time.
Three of us spent April 13–16 at Pabhoi village in an agricultural farm run by Neelam Dutta; it was so green with fields, variety of vegetable and floral plants, water bodies for fish culture, cattle etc.; indeed it was a very pleasant change for a person who has spent the entire life time at Chennai. There the Bihu was celebrated mainly for three days. The first day it was more like our “Maattu-p-Pongal” when the cattle were worshipped, very similar to harvest festival. Turmeric and moong dhal were ground together and the mixture was applied to the dozen or so animals, which are employed for ploughing and they were given a thourough wash in the pond. After that a special rope was tied around their neck and cut vegetables were thrown on them wishing them well and later they were also fed with those vegetables. After a while they were all assembled at a shed and the family members of Dutta joined in the celebration, when they smeared the turmeric-moong dhal mixture on each other and they along with the farm hands had a jolly few minutes jumping and shouting and taking pictures. The cows at Dutta’s home were also given a similar treatment.
Outside on the streets a sudden bazaar had sprung up with dozens of shops in make shift stalls selling snacks, balloons, bangles, toys and what have you. A huge crowd of tribal folk from nearby areas came marching, over a hundred men with their tongues and lips pierced with long sharp arrows walked along to the beats of drums to the Siva temple at the end of the street where Datta’s family home is situated. A big big crowd had gathered to witness the procession and generally have a day out. Next morning there was no trace of the bazaar!
On the second day younger people went to seek the blessings of their elders and also friends and relatives visited each other. Young girls dressed in the typical Assamese costume and the boys also in adult style clothes visit each house, with the girls dancing and the boys plying the pipes and drums. They were fed with sweets and gifted with money accepting which the children bless the people irrespective of them being much older householders. The third day was dedicated to the worship of the Almighty with special poojas at home.
Hope you enjoyed…
Originally published at https://laksquare.com.
