Gaatha Muga: Festival To Honor Demon

 Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

Nepalese farmers particularly the Nevahs celebrate the festival of Gaatha Muga in the Kathmandu Valley on the fourteenth day of the month of Srawon (July-August) to honor a demon called Gaatha Muga. Nevah farmers have developed the tradition of empowering themselves by possessing the spirit of the demon whom they dubbed as Gaatha Muga. Even today, some people dub a person with a stout, tall and heavy figure as Gaatha Muga that symbolizes power.

The festival of Gaatha Muga is an agricultural festival. So, Nevahs in general and Nevah farmers in particular celebrate this festival enthusiastically. This festival is celebrated after the completion of the transplantation of rice-seedlings. So, farmers enjoy celebrating this festival taking some time out of the fieldwork to entertain them.

Gaatha Muga festival opens a festival season in Nepal, as one festival after another follows it. In fact, this festival opens the season of entertainment, too. From this day on, farmers play the musical instruments they had stored on the eighth day called Bhal-bhal Astami in the month of Ashad (June-July) for the make-believe and practical reasons. The practical reason for forbidding the playing of musical instruments is either they have no time to play and make merry during this agricultural season or they must be very weary after the day’s heavy work in the field to play musical instruments. Practically, farmers have hardly any time to engage in entertainment during the rice-seedling transplantation season. The make-believe reason is that the playing of musical instruments will scare the demon that they have called over to them for assisting in their heavy fieldwork. So, it makes a good sense to store all sorts of musical instruments and abstain from playing musical instruments for the fear of frightening away the demon spirit working for them in the field.

In the month of Ashad (June-July) Nevah farmers become busy with rice-seedling transplantation. Farmers alone have difficulties in coping with the heavy work of rice-seedling transplantation. So, they call upon a benign demon to assist them in their hard fieldwork.

In order to call the demon over to them, first, Nevah farmers called Jyappu perform the ritual of inviting a demon. This is done before the onset of the monsoon on the second day of the bright fortnight of the month of Vaisak (April-May). With a pot of cooked rice, farmers go around the periphery of the old Kathmandu town where they believe the spirit of demon called Gaatha Muga resides and offer him the invitational cooked rice sprinkling it at these places. They also offer the cooked rice to Chowwasa Ajima to let the demon enter into the bodies of farmers. They believe that Chowwasa Ajima resides at all crossroads to protect the residents from demonic spirits.

The demon spirit of Gaatha Muga accepting the call of farmers enters the body of farmers for the period of the agricultural season.  The demon spirit residing in the bodies of farmers works in the field, and energizes the farmers’ bodies to work expeditiously and efficiently without getting tired. So, farmers could work more than their normal capacity permit them and they also could eat proportionally more, as they needed to feed the demon spirit they possessed during the season.

However, farmers make sure that other evil spirits do not follow them home. So, none of them brings anything green from the field for fear of the evil spirits taking shelter in those things and coming home with them. They would bring green leaves and fodders home only after the festival of Gaatha Muga in other words after sending the demon back to his place.

On the eighth day called Bhal-bhal Astami in the month of Ashad (June-July), the Navadurga troupe goes into recess and come back to life for regularly working only after the Dasain festival. Performers of the Navadurga troupe burned down the masks of all gods and goddesses on this day ending the annual activities. Nevahs believe that the spirits of all of the gods and goddesses forming the Navadurga troupe take shelter in water after two fishes possessing the spirits of all deities are released in the water of the river flowing nearby the temple to Brahmayani in Bhaktapur. So, none of the Nevah community would pollute the water in the field during the rice-transplantation, and play their traditional musical instruments from this day on to the day of the Gaatha Muga festival. They believe that Lord Ganesh one of the Navadurga troupe comes to life on the day of the Gaatha Muga festival, so, they restart playing musical instruments on this day. They raise two fingerlings in which the spirits of all deities reside in from this day on until the next Bhal-bhal Astami. These two fingerlings go along with the main deity called Mahalaxmi. All deities come to life again in the Navadurga troupe during the celebration of the Dasain festival.

Transplantation of rice-seedlings is forbidden after the Gaatha Muga festival in the Kathmandu Valley. So, farmers have to make sure that they have completed the transplantation of rice-seedlings before the day of the Gaatha Muga festival. This tradition of forbidding transplanting rice-seedlings must have set for practical purposes. The climate of the Kathmandu Valley cools down after the Gaatha Muga festival and the temperature will not be high enough to mature rice-seedlings. So, the rice-seedlings transplanted after the Gaatha Muga festival will be wasted.

Farmers celebrate the Gaatha Muga festival to appreciate the demon that has assisted them in completing the transplantation of rice-seedlings, and to honorably send him off for a year. However, in the course of time, some people have begun adding one new activity after another to this festival distorting the original purpose of celebrating this festival. They even gave a new name such as Ghanta Karna to the demon. They wrote different stories to explain the origin of the festival. Accordingly, they have changed their treatment to the demon from appreciating his assistance to abusing him.

On the eve of the festival, farmers clean their houses; they do their month-old sweat-soaked laundry. On the day of festival they clean off all mud and dirt they have accumulated during the period of the rice-seedling-transplantation season from their bodies. They prepare a special dish to dine over it in the evening.

On the day of the Gaatha Muga festival, girls depart with the dolls they have played with for a year. They collect their dolls made from linen and put them together in a thread for making a chain of dolls. They take the chain of dolls to the nearest crossroads where an effigy of Gaatha Muga stands, and put it around the effigy, and say goodbye to their dolls. They believe that if they keep the dolls even after the Gaatha Muga festival, evil spirits may take shelter in the dolls.

In the morning of the Gaatha Muga festival, grandparents purchase iron rings for all family members to wear on the ring finger until the festival of lights in October. They buy one ring for each family member. They go with those rings to the crossroads and symbolically offer those rings to the demon spirit touching those rings to the Gaatha Muga in an effigy and then distribute one ring each to all of the family members to wear. They believe that wearing such iron rings they will be safe from evil spirits. They wear the iron rings until the festival of lights. By then, they believe that the activities of evil spirits fade away.

In Kathmandu, youngsters set up a rope barrier on the road at each neighborhood called ‘tole’ to collect toll from drivers and passerby for expenses to perform the ceremony of honorably seeing-off Gaatha Muga. Ancient Nepalese rulers had given the locals the rights to collect a toll in the name of Gaatha Muga on this day for celebrating the Gaatha Muga festival nicely.

In Kathmandu, they have different ways of celebrating this festival than in Bhaktapur, Lalitpur, Pokhara and Hetauda. In the evening, they strip a man belonging to a historically sweeper caste down to the underwear and paint the human reproductive organs on his body. They feed him with yogurt and flattened rice on a clay bowl. Normally, Nepalis feed someone with yogurt and flattened rice on a clay bowl as a last wish. Youngsters take almost the naked man around the ‘tole’ to collect the last toll from all households. Youngsters give him all the money they have collected during a day. Thereafter, the man sits on a bunch of fresh green reeds. Then, youngsters drag it to a nearby riverbank to dispose it of. Over there, everyone takes a purification dip in the water of the river and comes back home triumphantly after seeing off the demon.

In Bhaktapur, people celebrate the Gaatha Muga festival differently. Each neighborhood called ‘tole’ has its Gaatha Muga in Bhaktapur. Members of each ‘tole’ community contribute labor or cash voluntarily to make an effigy of Gaatha Muga. People at each ‘tole’ make a wheat straw effigy of Gaatha Muga with a painted clay pot as a head. They paint a beautiful demon face on a clay pot and set tree roots on it as hairs and then set the head on the wheat-straw body. It takes almost a day for a few volunteers to make such an effigy of Gaatha Muga. In the evening, youngsters make wheat-straw torches tying bundles of wheat straw to a stick. Each youngster carries such a torch to show Gaatha Muga the way to its destination. Depending upon the size and weight of an effigy one or two men carry it on a shoulder pole to the cremation site. People carrying an effigy dance on the way to amuse the onlookers, once they reach its destination, the effigy is placed on the ground. Youngsters toss the torches they have carried on the effigy of Gaatha Muga and burned it down. Thereafter, everyone takes a purification dip in the water of the nearby stream and come back home chanting the names of gods and goddesses.

On the night of the Gaatha Muga festival, Nevahs perform the rituals of warding off evil spirits. In the late night of this day, a Tantric priest performs rites to bring together all evil spirits to feast on their favorite dish placed in a clay bowl. The priest decorates it with various Tantric flags to keep all evil spirits around this clay pot. After the completion of the Tantric offerings that bind all evil spirits in the clay bowl together, a man carries the bowl to the nearest crossroads and leave it over there. After leaving the bowl with the evil spirits at the crossroads, the man neither looks back nor speaks with anyone on the way back home. Another person keeps his company quietly following him. Before entering the house, they wash their mouths and faces to keep away any traces of evil spirits following them. If they failed to follow the rules strictly, evil spirits might follow them back home. Thereafter, the Tantric priest utters Mantras on a triangular nails, a feather of peacock and some other items packed in a piece of cloth. Then, they drive this nail holding all these items together on the beam of the main entrance to the house. This helps them prevent evil spirits reentering the house. Thereafter, they keep the door close for that night. Most of the Nevah households perform this ritual.

The day of Gaatha Muga is one of the very auspicious days for witches. Learners of this craft begin their lesson on this night giving offerings to Lord Ganesh and Goddess Kali. Lord Ganesh is the god of success, and Goddess Kali is the goddess of learning black magic. Witches in the black magic business worship the god and goddess on this day of Gaatha Muga to polish up their skills. Every one of them carries a small wicker hand basket in which they hold everything they need to offer Goddess Kali. A small wick lamp in the basket provides them with light on the way to the deities. Witches satisfy all evil spirits hanging around on the way meeting their demand whatever it might be taking out of their wicker baskets. Nevahs believe that witches can hold everything in such a wicker basket using their magic power. This is done by their black magic power. Witches perform black magic rites at the mid night.

On this night of Gaatha Muga, faith healers also offer worship to Goddess Kali to receive blessings from her to be skillful in black magic so that they could outwit witches and capture them whenever they dwell in someone and trouble innocent persons. Sometimes, faith healers compete with witches. Such competition leads to confrontation and even to a fight that ends in the death of either a faith healers or of a witch.

The Gaatha Muga festival is one such example of the Nepalese culture of appreciating anybody who helps them even in the imaginary way. Every year Nevahs celebrate this festival in honor of a demon called Gaatha Muga that has helped them in the transplantation of rice-seedlings.

July 18, 2009.