Dashain Festival

Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

During the Dashain festival we worship Durga Bhavani. The word Durga is derived from the word Durgay means the relief from sufferings. So, Durga means the goddess who relieves us from our sufferings. She killed Mahishasur: the most notorious demon relieving the deities and humans from the suffering caused by the monster's misdeeds in the Hindu world. Our ancestors had depicted ego, jealousy and contempt as the evils. Later on they called those bad habits demons. They set the tradition of reminding the killing of those bad habits once a year. To kill Mahishasur means to destroy all bad habits of humans. So, Vijaya Dashain means victory over the most demonic habits such as anger, contempt, and jealousy. Therefore, celebrating the Dashain festival spiritually means controlling our mind, and finishing off the demonic evils such as anger, contempt and jealousy.

Mystical Goddess Durga Bhavani is a beautiful woman came out of the God Rudra's third eye. She has eighteen limbs. God Himal gave her a tiger to ride on. Lord Shiva gave her a Trishul; Lord Vishnu gave her his spinning disc, and Lord Indra gave her his Vajra. Thus, different gods gave her different weapons to empower her to kill demon Mahishasur.

Goddess Durga Bhavani also is the combined form of nine goddesses called Navadurga. Nepalis believe that Goddess Durga Bhavani herself created one goddess after another to empower herself to fight against the demon army. She went on creating the goddesses, and their number reached nine. They together fought against the demon army and finished them off.

In the course of our cultural and religious development, our ancestors had made us believe that evil spirits of demons went in hiding in animals and birds to escape the killing from the goddesses and convinced us to kill as many animals and birds as possible to benefit because we believe that we are killing the demons not the innocent animals and birds. We kill so many animals and birds in public and give the impression of a real war. Probably, time has come to understand the hidden meaning of Goddess Durga Bhavani and gradually improve the festival celebration rather than blindly following the tradition.

The activities of Dashain start with the beginning of making offerings to ancestors on the first day of the dark fortnight in Aswin (September-October). We perform offerings called ‘sradha’ to our ancestors on any one day of 16 days: starting on the full moon day of the bright fortnight and ending on the last day of the dark fortnight in Aswin. We believe that our religious or social undertakings will not be fruitful if the ancestors are not satisfied. Hence, Nepalis set the tradition of first making offerings to the ancestors before celebrating any significant festival or performing any important ceremonies. Hence, our ancestors celebrate the Dashain festival before their progeny on earth. In other words ancestors participate in the Dashain festival a few days before their offspring celebrate on earth.

In celebrating the Dashain festival, we worship nine-mother goddesses starting on the first day of the bright fortnight and ending on the ninth day in Aswin believing every day one mother goddess appeared to fight against the demons. On the first day, the main goddess called Brahmayani emerged and began fighting against the demon army. On this day we install holy water jar in our special prayer room to summon the goddess. We call this day Ghata-sthapna literally meaning ceremonial installation of a holy water jar. We also sow seeds of barley in a specially prepared sand bed around the holy water jar or in a baked clay pots. People of different communities have different traditions of venerating the goddess.

On the second day Goddess Maheswori emerged to fight along with Goddess Brahmayani against the demon, hence, Nepalis worship Goddess Maheswori on the second of the Dashain. Thus, on the third day Goddess Kaumari, on the fourth day Goddess Bhadrakali, on the fifth day Goddess Barahi, on the sixth day Goddess Indrayani, on the seventh day Goddess Mahakali, on the eighth day Goddess Mahalaxmi and on the ninth day Goddess Tripuresvori showed up and together with all goddesses fought against the demon army and won victory over them. The period of the nine days is called Nava-ratri. On the ninth day Nepalis worship Goddess Tripuresvori, and then all nine goddess together.

On the ninth day Nepalis make offerings to their equipment, machines, tools and vehicles. Artisans, farmers, craftsmen, mechanics and traders make offerings to their tools, equipment, vehicle and instruments. Some even offer animal and bird sacrifice to those means of work. They believe that by doing so they increase the efficiency of those vehicles, equipment, machines and tools at the same time avoid accidents for a year.

The Nevah community makes offering to the virgin girls on the ninth day.  They believe that the virgin girls possessed by the most powerful goddess called Kumari.  Hence, they revere the young girls on this day. Goddess Kumari is the source of the power, prestige and status in the society. Every Nevah household keeps Goddess Kumari in one non-living form or another, and makes offerings to her every day.

The tenth day is the most important day of the Dashain festival for all Hindu Nepalis. We call this day Vijaya Dashain means the victory day. We perform concluding religious rituals, and make offerings to Goddess Durga Bhavani: combined form of the nine goddesses. Then, we begin offering the blessings of the almighty goddess first to the family members starting from the senior most among the family members. We reserve this first day generally for offering the blessings of the goddesses to the extended family members only. Thereafter, relatives, friends and colleagues begin offering the blessings of the deity to the juniors until the eve of the full moon day in Aswin.  Therefore, juniors visit seniors for receiving the blessings of the goddesses as well as of theirs too.

On the full moon day Nepalis dispose all the remains of the offerings made to the goddesses in the nearest river and end the Dashain festival. Thus, Dashain is the longest festival Nepalis celebrate starting on the first day of the bright fortnight and ending on the full moon day in Aswin.

Updated September 19, 2009

This year, the Dashain festival has started on September 19, 2009 and ends on October 3, 2009.