"Diwali - Festival of lights"
We all know Diwali as “Festival of lights “. India has different states and culture inside the country, every state/society celebrate the festival in its unique way. As the northern part of India, celebrates it based on the arrival of Lord Rama , in souther part we celebrate the festival related to Lord krishna .I am from a state called “Tamil Nādu,” and I love to share one of the ways of celebration in our state. Even in Tamil Nādu, we have different societies and districts, and the celebration mode differs. Are you excited to read more about the festival? Please scroll down.
Why do we celebrate Diwali?
More than calling the festival “Diwali,” we call it “Deepavali” or “Deepa Oli thirunaal” in Tamil Nadu. In Tamilnadu, the “Diwali celebration” story is related to Lord Krishan and Demon Naragasuran. The story as follows: Demon Naragasuran was born to Earth God and Lord Vishnu. He caused a lot of trouble for people. He got a boon as no one other than his mother could kill him. As his troubles were getting worse, lord Vishnu decided to kill him and end his worse behavior. Lord Vishnu was born as “Lord Krishna,” and Goddess Lakshmi was born as “Sathiyabama.”One fine day, Lord Krishna and Naragasuran face each other with bow and arrow in the battleground. Because of the boon, Lord Krishna couldn’t kill him. While fighting with the demon, Lord Krishna played the trick of acting dead and fell to the ground. Sathiyabama got angry and shot an arrow at Naragasuran and killed him. People celebrated his death as Deepavali by lighting lamps symbolizing the dark days were gone. Hence Deepavali is considered the “Festival of lights.”
How do we celebrate Deepavali /Diwali
Diwali celebration starts a week before by preparing various sweet and snack varieties. We do wheat halwa, Rava ladoo, different kinds of murukku, moong dal ladoo, bhoondi ladoo, etc. We prepare special medicine called “Deepavali Marundhu/Deepavali legiyam” – it is a mixture of various year-old spices. This is mainly to take care of digestion after consuming all sweets etc. It tastes yummy as well.
The actual celebration starts the day before Deepavali day, more precisely, “Diwali eve.” We prepare an evening snack called Bhajji, along with coconut chutney . Rice, small onion sambhar, potato fry, vermicelli kheer, papad, and tomato rasam for dinner. This is our standard menu for Diwali eve.
We don’t perform any specific pooja . We keep sandalwood powder and Kumkum on four corners of the new costumes and keep it in front of the god, along with all the sweets and savories.
On the day of Diwali, we wake up early in the morning (before sunrise – we call it Brahma muhurtham). We burst one cracker, apply oil on the hair by after taking one ball of Deepavali Marundhu .Then take oil bath , wear new dresses , do some prayers and again start bursting crackers. Taking a sesame oil bath is one of the vital traditions on Diwali day. As per the tradition taking an oil bath removes all the evil from our life. The oil preparation has a separate process – We need to heat the oil in the medium by adding pepper, cumin seeds, red chilies, ajwain seeds, and turmeric for medicinal value.
The day goes by visiting friends, relatives, temples, etc. and the Diwali celebration is one of the happiest moments during childhood, even now.
Interested to know all of your Diwali experience. Please share it in the comment section.