Celebrating Gaatha Muga Festival*

By Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

The whole Newar family members become busy at doing one thing or another on the day of the festival of Gaatha Muga. Everyone has something special to do on this occasion. Some people spend a whole day on making the effigy of Gaatha Muga and then on sending him off with honor at night. The festival ends with the offer of a favorite dish to Gaatha Muga at the night.

On this day, a granddaughter is busy in preparing a chain of all of her dolls made of scrap fabric to offer it to Gaatha Muga. She takes it to the nearest crossroads where an effigy of Gaatha Muga stands for public display. She places the chain of her dolls around the effigy and then says good-bye to her dolls that have become her companions for a year. They go along with the effigy to cremation on that night. Children and the adults too believe that the spirit of the demon might remain in the dolls if they keep them.

A grandmother is in a hurry to go and buy iron rings for all family members to wear on the ring finger until the festival of lights in October. She buys one ring for each family member, takes those rings to the crossroads and let those rings touch the effigy of Gaatha Muga. Then, she takes those rings as the blessings from the demon. She distributes one each ring to all family members to wear on the ring finger. They believe that such iron rings protect them from all sorts of evil spirits. They keep them wearing until the festival of lights. By then they believe that the evil spirits fade away.

Daughters-in-law, daughters and sisters are very busy with the preparation of the festival feast. They cook various sorts of meat dishes, bean dishes and vegetable dishes for a feast in the evening. They also prepare the items required for making a favorite dish of Gaatha Muga to offer him at night.

Grandsons are also busy with collecting tolls from the pedestrians and drivers at the crossroads in the name of Gaatha Muga on this day. Ancient rulers have given youngsters the rights to collect tolls from the pedestrians on this day for meeting the expenses of celebrating the festival of Gaatha Muga. They use the money for making an effigy of the demon and then taking it to cremation. This tradition has continued even today. Youngsters set up a rope barrier at crossroads to stop vehicles and then collect tolls from the drivers. Everyone pays the toll as s/he deems it. Some youngsters go with a wicker circular cake of about a meter diameter to each and every store asking for the toll in the name of Gaatha Muga. They believe that they strictly need to spend the money collected on the good send off of Gaatha Muga otherwise he would not let them live in peace.

Different towns have their own way of making an effigy of Gaatha Muga. Grown-up brothers voluntarily collect materials and make an effigy of Gaatha Muga in every neighborhood called tole. In Kathmandu, they make a very simple effigy of Gaatha Muga. They put together three bundles of green reeds making a tripod and attach a paper painted with the image of Gaatha Muga to the tripod at the top. You will see such an effigy of Gaatha Muga at every crossroads of the old part of Kathmandu on this day. In Bhaktapur, they make a beautiful effigy of Gaatha Muga from wheat straw and a clay pot. They paint the image of the demon on clay pot and set it on the shoulder of a wheat straw body. They attach fine roots of trees to the clay head of the demon to make them look like hairs. Similarly, other towns such as Lalitpur, Pokhara and Hetauda have their own way of making the effigy of Gaatha Muga.

People have different ways of celebrating the festival of Gaatha Muga. In Kathmandu, youngsters buy a pot of yogurt and flattened rice and feed the mixture of flattened rice and yogurt in a clay bowl to a person impersonating Gaatha Muga. Then, they strip him down to the underwear and draw human reproductive organs on his bare body. Then, youngsters take him around the tole collecting the last round of tolls from all households. They give all of the money collected as the tolls from drivers, pedestrians, storeowners and householders to the person impersonating Gaatha Muga. Youngsters wind up the effigy of Gaatha Muga from the crossroads. They set it on the ground and let the person playing the role of Gaatha Muga sit on the bundles of green reeds. Thereafter, they drag it along with the man to a nearby riverbank to dispose it of. Thus, they send off Gaatha Muga. After seeing of Gaatha Muga, everyone takes a purification dip in the water of a nearby stream or river and come back home.

In Bhaktapur, men carry the straw effigy of Gaatha Muga on shoulder poles if it is heavy. If it is a hollow effigy, a person wears it and carries it even dancing on the way to the sending-off site. Some youngsters make wheat straw torches tying bundles of wheat straw to sticks and carry them in their hands to show the way to the demon. They let the effigy stands at its destination for some time and shout various slogans before burning it down. Then, someone sets a fire on it. Thereafter, youngsters toss their straw torches on the effigy and burn it down there. Then, everybody takes a purification dip in the water of a river and come back home chanting names of various gods and goddesses.

In Nepal, every festival has its reasons for celebration. The festival of Gaatha Muga has its meaning, too. Gaatha Muga is a benevolent demon. He has been assisting the farmers in transplanting rice seedlings during the agricultural season. Farmers therefore in appreciation of his assistance celebrate the sending him off as the festival of Gaatha Muga on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight in the month called Srawon (July-August) in the Vikram calendar.

In the Kathmandu Valley, Newar farmers have developed the tradition of empowering themselves by being possessed by the spirit of the demon whom they dubbed as Gaatha Muga. They perform the rituals of inviting the spirit of demon on the second day of the bright fortnight in Baishakh (April-May) in the Vikram calendar. Farmers go with a pot of cooked rice to the areas where they believe the demon dwells in and offer him the cooked rice sprinkling it at these places for invoking Gaatha Muga. They also offer the cooked rice to Chhowasa Ajima at each crossroads requesting her for permitting Gaatha Muga to enter the town.

Dwelling at each crossroads, Chhowasa Ajima guards every tole from evil spirits. So, Chhowasa Ajima makes sure that the spirit of Gaatha Muga goes back to his area after the completion of the transplantation of rice seedlings. Therefore, the demon in effigy stands at each crossroads on the day of the festival of Gaatha Muga, and then in the evening it goes to its destination.

After the ceremony of inviting the spirit of demon is over, they put their traditional musical instruments on shelves so that no one would play them. They believe that if they play the musical instruments the spirit of demon takes fright at the sound of the musical instruments. However, it is also the fact that they have not much time for playing the instruments during the rice-seedling-transplanting season. So, they have other reasons too for not playing musical instruments until the festival of Gaatha Muga is over.

The farmers possessed by the spirit of demon work harder than they used to. Thus, Nepalis have developed the culture of deploying even the spirit of demon in the agriculture. They therefore appreciate the assistance of the demon and honor him after the completion of the agricultural season celebrating the send-off of the demon called Gaatha Muga. Traditionally, farmers do not transplant the rice seedlings after the festival of Gaatha Muga in the Kathmandu Valley.

At night, Nepalis make the last offerings of the most favorite dish of the demon at the crossroads. They prepare the dish filling flattened-rice husk in a clay bowl and then add to it fresh animal blood, raw meat and black soybeans. Then they insert a small clay bowl with burning charcoals to the dish. Someone puts grains of mustard seeds on the charcoal fire to produce mustard fumes that Gaatha Muga likes very much. A person takes the dish to the nearest crossroads and leaves it there. This is how Nepalis honor Gaatha Muga that has so generously assisted farmers in the transplantation of rice seedlings.
   
* It was first published in ‘The Sunday Post’ of ‘The Kathmandu Post’ on August 08, 1999.