Ghoda jatra: Festival of ‘Pahan Carhai’ and Horse Race

Siddhi B. Ranjitkar

On the new moon day of the dark fortnight in the month called Caitra (March-April) in the Nepal calendar, Kathmanduites celebrate the festival called ‘Ghoda jatra’. The indigenous people of Kathmandu called Nevah celebrate it for three days. One day before the ‘Ghoda jatra’ the Nevah community celebrate ‘Pahan carhai’. On this day, they make offerings to guardian grandmother goddesses called ‘Ajimas’, and the guardian God called ‘Luku Mahadeo’ means hidden Lord Shiva. On the second day, they take a white horse belonging to the Living Goddess Kumari to the open space called Tundikhel in Kathmandu to trample the evil spirit believed to be residing there. And on the third and last day, they celebrate the outings of the grandmother goddesses and their meeting at ‘Ason’ square.

The Nepalese history has it that King Gunakamdev built a city-state called ‘Kantipur’ currently known, as Kathmandu in the shape of a large double-edged knife called ‘Khadga’ in 724 A.D. ‘Khadga’ is the symbol of power and authority. He enshrined eight grandmother goddesses at eight peripheral sites and God Pacali Bhairava at the main entrance to the city-state in the south to protect the citizenry from demons and evil spirits.

Following the protocol of seniority, King Gunakamdev enshrined these eight grandmother goddesses called ‘Ajimas’ at the eight peripheral sites of ancient ‘Kantipur’: ‘Pasiko Ajima’ Brahmani at the Sanskrit School, ‘Lumari Ajima’ Mahesvori (Bhadrakali) in front of Singha darbar, ‘Phibva Ajima’ Kaumari at the army headquarters, Nai Ajima’ Vaisnavi at Pacali, ‘Kanga Ajima’ Barahi at the Visnumati River, ‘Luti Ajima’ Indrayani further north at the Visnumati River, ‘Thabahi Ajima’ Camunda at Thabahi and finally Candralakhu Ajima’ Mahalaxmi at the Narayanhiti Museum. If we draw a figure joining all these sites then we find a shape of ‘Khagda’.

In 1460 A.D. more than seven hundred years later, King Amar Malla set the tradition of honoring these eight grandmother goddesses once every twelve year. Later on, religious-minded kings transformed the twelve-yearly festival into the current day annual festival of the outings of the grandmother goddesses, worship of the hidden guardian god called ‘Luku Mahadeo’ and the horserace show called ‘Ghoda jatra’.

The indigenous Nevah community celebrates the first day festival called ‘Pahan carhai’ on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight in Caitra. Possibly, the word is derived from the word ‘pisaca‘ means demon, and ‘carhai’ means fourteenth day of the dark fortnight, as the Nevah community reveres ‘Luku Mahadeo’ believed to be the demonic incarnation of Lord Shiva on this day. He is the guardian God; so we find ‘Luku Mahadeo’ at every courtyard in Kathmandu.

Formerly, residents of ‘Kantipur’ including the then rulers made Tantric offerings to the eight powerful Tantric grandmother goddesses enshrined at different peripheral sites believing that these deities would protect them from various diseases, natural calamities and so on which at that time they thought were caused by the spells of evil spirits and demons. Today’s Nevahs simply followed their ancestors.

On the first day of the festival, early in the morning, Nevah men, women and children carrying a brass tray or a container with the full of items of offerings altogether called ‘puja’ visit eight grandmother goddess at their field sites. After making offerings to grandmother goddesses, the Nevah community feasts on various festive dishes and drinks.

In the evening, the Nevah community retrieves the hidden Tantric God called ‘Luku Mahadeo’ from the trash pit at every courtyard, and then decorates him with the yellow mustard flowers and white radish flowers symbolizing the decorations of the god with golden and silver flowers. Then, they make a garland of green garlic plants and decorate the god with it. All these decorations have Tantric meanings. Thereafter, they make the offerings of a Tantric dish called ‘samhya’ that comprises puffed rice, roasted meat, roasted black soybeans, pieces of ginger, home-brewed drink and home-distilled alcohol. Then, they consecrate the rest of the dish touching it to the ‘Luku Mahadeo’ and eat it as the blessing from the god. This is how they get the blessing from ‘Luku Mahadeo.’

Following the tradition, the Nevah community of Buddha Vihar sets up a ‘Luku Mahadeo’ at the trash pit in the courtyard at the Brahma Tole in Kathmandu. On the eighth day of the dark fortnight of ‘caitra’ in the Nepal Calendar, a group of devotees goes with a musical band to Pashupati shrine in Kathmandu, and brings a small ‘Lingam’ on a small chariot carried on shoulder poles, and hides it at the trash pit in the courtyard of the Buddha Vihar at the Brahma Tole, and call it ‘Luku Mahadeo’ means hidden Mahadeo. Some people believe that the ‘Lingam’ thus hidden in the trash pit is ‘pisaca‘: the demonic incarnation of Lord Shiva, and explain it in different myths.

On the night of the first day of the festival, as the revelers at other courtyards, revelers symbolically dig ‘Luku Mahadeo’ out from the trash pit at the Brahma Tole, too, wash it, and clean it up. They decorate it with yellow mustard flowers and white radish flowers, and a garland of green garlic plants, and make offerings of the Tantric dish called ‘samhya’. While making Tantric offerings to ‘Luku Mahadeo’, they keep lighting a wick oil lamp on a stone stand and cover it with a clay bowl  on an upside down position for collecting soot in it. They mix the soot with mustard seed oil and apply it on the eyes believing that wearing such gel would protect them from evil spirits.

Two different myths unravel the mystery of ‘Luku Mahadeo’:

The first myth is about a demon called Bhasmasur. He wants to possess unique power. He could receive such power only from the almighty god called Shiva. So, he practices the transcendental meditation for a considerable time and pleases Lord Shiva. The almighty god always meets the desires of his devotees. After being pleased with the dedication of Bhasmasur, Lord Shiva descends on earth from the cosmic world and appears before the meditating Bhasmasur to grant him a boon of his choice. Lord Shiva said, “O! Bhasmasur, I am pleased with you very much; so, I am here to meet your wish if you have on your mind.”

Rising from almost the state of hibernation and clasping his hands together at his chest, Bhasmasur first touches the feet of Lord Shiva, and then said, “Please grant me the power of converting everything into ashes by the touch of my hand.”

Without thinking twice, Lord Shiva said, “So be it.”

Then, Bhasmasur wants to test the newly acquired power on none other than Lord Shiva. So, Bhasmasur goes after Lord Shiva. To escape from the chase of Bhasmasur, Lord Shiva hides in a trash pit.

At the same time, in the cosmic world, Lord Vishnu realizes the self-created problem of Lord Shiva on earth. So, he also descends on earth from the cosmic world to save Lord Shiva from the hand of Bhasmasur. Lord Vishnu transforms himself to a beautiful lady, and appears before Bhasmasur. Seeing so beautiful lady, Bhasmasur forgets to chase Lord Shiva, and makes advances to the fascinating lady. She proposes Bhasmasur to dance following her steps and hand movements. Unsuspecting Bhasmasur could not say no to her proposal and follows the steps she makes and follows the movements of her hands. The dancing of Bhasmasur with the gorgeous lady has been for several hours. By that time, Bhasmasur has already forgotten the mythical power he has received from Lord Shiva. Ultimately, Lord Vishnu in the guise of a stunning beauty tricks Bhasmasur to touch his own head and burns out himself to ashes.

So, we retrieve Lord Shiva called ‘Luku Mahadeo’ hidden in a trash pit and put him to the Tantric net so that he would not escape from the human world to the cosmic world without enjoying the delicious food. Then, we offer him the Tantric dishes and drinks to enjoy on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight in ‘caitra’ in the Nepal calendar. So, we call this day ‘picasa caturdasi’ means fourteenth day of demon.

Another myth is about Goddess Parvati: the consort of Lord Shiva. One day having the nostalgic feeling for enjoying a lavish meat dishes and drinks she had enjoyed in her past incarnations of powerful Tantric goddesses such as Kali, Devi and Ajima, Goddess Parvati said to Lord Shiva, “O! My lord, I have the strong feeling for enjoying hot and lavish meat dishes and drinks, why don’t you meet my wishes when you meet the wishes of everyone of your devotees?”

Being the Vedic god, Lord Shiva cannot think of accepting any such dishes and drinks that consort Parvati wishes for. So, he has to take a different form that could enjoy such dishes and drinks. Lord Shiva goes to hiding in a nearby mustard field and takes the form of ‘Luku Mahadeo’: a demonic form of Lord Shiva.

The Nevah community finds Lord Shiva hidden in the mustard field and makes offerings of spicy dishes and alcoholic drinks to the lord. Lord Shiva descends on earth from the cosmic world and takes the form of ‘picasa’ means a demonic form to avoid his real identity, and hides in a mustard field. The Nevah community retrieves him from the mustard field and identifies him as ‘Luku Mahadeo’ means hidden Lord Shiva, and puts him into the Tantric net. Then, the Nevahs offer him all sorts of meat dishes and drinks. Lord Shiva shares all those dishes and drinks with his spouse Parvati. Thus, Lord Shiva meets the desire of his spouse Parvati. This has happened on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight in ‘caitra’. So, the Nevah community celebrates this day as the day of ‘Pisaca’. In Bhaktapur, the Nevah community even today calls this day ‘pasa carhai’ probably derived from ‘pisaca’ whereas in Kathmandu this has been distorted to ‘Pahan carhai’.

On the night of ‘Pahan carhai’, the residents of a neighborhood called Nyatai in the northwestern part of Kathmandu hold the dance of Nyata-maru Ajima. On this occasion, the dance troupe of Tantric gods and goddesses also performs. Lord Ganesh performs the opening dance; then Lord Bhairava follows him to perform a regular dance and then one grandmother goddess after another performs ritualistic dances. The performances continue the whole night. Sometimes, such divine dances continue until the next morning. At the end of the performances, all performers impersonating gods and goddesses perform ritualistic dances together. All these are Tantric performances and in codes. Currently, Nyata-maru Ajima is popularly called Naradevi.

During the performances of dances, the masked dancers take the sacrifices of animals: three male buffaloes and five male sheep. Attendants to the divine dancers stretch out the legs of buffaloes and force them to sit on their bellies. Then, the ceremonial butcher cuts the veins at the necks of the buffaloes and sends a jet of blood to the mouths of the divine dancers. Concerning the sacrifice of sheep, a man impersonating God Bhairava himself takes the sheep and cuts their veins and directs the jet of blood to the mouths of other divine dancers. Thus, divine mask dancers ceremoniously drink the blood of three buffaloes and five sheep.

On the second day of the festival, all women of this area called Nyatai married to the men of other neighborhoods during the year bring an auspicious offering called ‘sagun’ to Naradevi. ‘Sagun’ comprises hard-boiled peeled and then fried eggs, fried dry fishes, alcoholic drinks and yogurt. All these four items represent five life-supporting elements such as earth, air, water, heat and ether. So, offering ‘sagun’ means offering the life sacrifice. Thus, women of this area married to the men of other areas revere their tutelary Goddess Naradevi. From the second year onward, they simply make a visit to Goddess Naradevi on this festival day.

On the second day of the festival, residents of Kathmandu performs the rituals of feeding an especial dish called ‘marha ja’ to their kids that have not lost a first tooth yet at their respective neighborhood called ‘tole’. They believe that this especial dish develops immunity in their kids. At each neighborhood, members of the association called ‘guthi’ responsible for holding the feast called ‘marha ja’ cook rice, lentils, vegetables, meat, and beans following the Tantric rituals.

The ‘guthi’ members start off feeding the kids ‘marha ja’ at about 11:00 in the morning. They lay long narrow straw mats out for kids to sit. Parents bring their kids and seat them on these straw mats laid on the street in a row. Then, members of the association set one leaf plate to each kid. They sever one item of the dish after another on the leaf plates.

They stitch eight broad leaves together to make such leaf plates. They use bamboo needles to stitch broad leaves together for making leaf plates. They follow Tantric principles to make leaf plates. They first stitch two leaves together. This forms the base of a leaf plate. Then, they stitch six other leaves around the two-leaf base for making a leaf plate. Each leaf plate is made of eight leaves. Tantrically, the eight leaves represent eight mother goddesses.

One attendant after another serves various items of the dish called ‘marha ja’. First, an attend serves the rice then another attendant serves meat and so on. Then, kids eat ‘marha ja’ by hands. Sisters or mothers feed the kids that cannot feed themselves. Anybody wishing to serve any food item or offer a coin to the kids can do so on this occasion.

In the afternoon, another religious event is held at Tundikhel: an open space at the heart of Kathmandu. The Nevah community believes a demon called Tundi resides there. Attendants to the Living Goddess Kumari take the goddess’s white horse to Tundikhel to trample a demon Tundi also called Guru-mappa residing there. Most of the people believe that the name Tundikhel of this place is derived from the name of demon Tundi. Once, the demon had troubled the residents of Kathmandu. So, Living Goddess Kumari sent her white horse to trample the demon and subdue him forever. Attendants to Goddess Kumari repeat this trampling of the demon every year. This annual trampling of the demonic spirit at the Tundikhel is actually the ‘Ghoda jatra’.

Living Goddess Kumari watches the trampling of the demonic spirit from a special building built at the place where the building of the Nepal Airlines Corporation stands today. Nepal Airlines Corporation has allocated one room for the Living Goddess Kumari. Currently, Goddess Kumari watches the trampling of the demonic spirit from this room the Nepal Airlines Corporation has allocated to her for this annual ceremony of watching the subduing of the demonic spirit.

After the return from the tour of the European countries, the first Rana Prime Minister set the tradition of the horserace show after the trampling of the demonic spirit by the white horse belonging to the Living Goddess Kumari. Initially, it was a simple horse race show but it has developed into the current pompous show.

Currently, the Nepal Army stages a horse race, motorbike performances, bicycle race and so on at Tundikhel. The Nepal Army also holds various contests for the public in general and awards the winners of the contests. Sitting at the Nepal Army pavilion, high-ranking state civil, army and police officials and invited-foreign diplomats watch various shows.

On the midnight of the second day of the three-day festival, the festival of seven grandmother goddesses out of the eight enshrined at various peripheral sites of Kantipur is held at Tundikhel. Attendants to the goddesses bring six-grandmother goddesses on their respective chariots carrying on the shoulder poles to Tundikhel and keep them waiting until the third Grandmother Goddess ‘Kanga Ajima’ arrives on her chariot carried by the attendants.

Upon arrival at Tundikhel, Grandmother Goddess ‘Kanga Ajima’ goes round other sister Goddesses sitting on their respective chariot exchanging pleasantries. Thereafter, she bows to the senior most Goddess ‘Lumari Ajima’. Then, the torchbearers swap the torches on behalf of the goddess they have accompanied. Thereafter, the chariots of goddesses touch each other for symbolically taking leave of each other. This is called the ritual of colliding chariots. Then, porters carry them back to their respective town abode.

On the third day and final day of the three-day festival, the festival of meeting of seven Grandmother Goddess is held at Ason Square in old Kathmandu. The senior most grandmother goddess called ‘Lumari Ajima’ presides over the meeting of the seven divine sisters. This meeting is held to find out the reasons for one of their divine sisters not attending the festival.

Attendants to each grandmother goddess wearing caps of the color allocated to them to distinguish from others carry their own grandmother goddess on a chariot and bring each grandmother goddess from the alley allocated to each of them to the Ason Square. Musical bands lead each chariot and the procession of devotees follows it. All younger grandmother goddesses pay a special homage to the senior most goddess, then hold a meeting and then return back to their respective town abode. This is called ‘Ason jatra’.

Grandmother Goddess ‘Luti Ajima’ does not participate in the festival of meeting of the divine sisters, as she reaches one-day later and misses the first day of the festival. So, the especial festival of ‘Luti Ajima’ is held eight-month later on the fourteenth day of the dark fortnight in Marga (November-December) of the Nepal calendar.

She misses the first day of the festival, as she gets misinformed about the festival when Lord Pashupati goes to invite all sister goddesses to ‘Pahan carhai’. A week before the festival of ‘Pahan carhai’, devotees carry a ‘Lingam’ that represents Lord Pashupati on a chariot from his resident at Deupatan to eight different grandmother goddesses, and perform the rituals of extending an invitation to each grandmother goddess’s field shrine to participate in the festival. This is called du-du cyan-cyan.

Another version of the reason for ‘Luti Ajima’ not attending the festival of divine sisters is once one of the sister goddesses hosting a feast has humiliated her at one of the feasts held for all sisters at their natal home. Other seven sisters are rich. So, they wear expensive jewelry on top of the extraordinary clothing. Poor ‘Luti Ajima’ and her kids are not properly dressed. None of the host’s family members notices ‘Luti Ajima’ and her kids. So, ‘Luti Ajima’ and her kids are sitting on one of the corners of the abode. Nobody serves them any food and drinks. When her kids cry for food, someone hurls dry and hard bread on them hitting and wounding one of them.

Next day, to her surprise, ‘Luti Ajima’ finds the bread turned into gold. Next time, she could afford to wear expensive clothes and jewelry for the party of all sisters. Everybody appreciates her rich outfit and jewelry and serves her nice food and drinks but she refuses to eat and drink anything thinking that food and drinks served to her are not actually intended for her but for the expensive garment and jewelry she wore. Since then she has refused to attend the festival in the group, and resorted to celebrating her separate festival.

Our ancestors had once developed and designed various Tantric rituals to protect themselves from the presumed demonic evil spirits. We continue to follow these rituals as our cultural heritage. In course of time some of the activities and even names might get distorted.

March 11, 2010

Notes:
1.    The names of eight grandmother goddesses called Ajimas given next to the Nevah names are the Shastriya names of Ajimas.
2.    Ghoda Jatra is on March 15 this year.