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Kathmandu Thursday November 01, 2001 Kartik 16, 2058.
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Kojagrat Poornima: Night of vigil and
prayers to Mahalaxmi
By Perina Pathak
KATHMANDU, Oct 31 – With Kojagrat Poornima observed
across the length and breadth of the Hindu Kingdom Wednesday, it’s time to bid
farewell to this year’s Dashain festival. People are now getting back to work with
the festival hangovers.
Five days after they celebrated Bijaya Dashamee or Dashain
putting on red Tika and Jamara on their foreheads, people in the capital city and
elsewhere are back to work. The festive mood is almost over, and the empty streets of the
capital city are seeing short and long distance buses, taxis and automobiles back.
The perfect blue autumn sky of Kathmandu Valley is slowly
beginning to collect dusts and emissions in its air. Kojagrat Poornima literally means the
night of full moon when people stay awake.
On the last day of the festival Wednesday, people were seen
disposing the Jamara (barley shoots) and withered flowers offered to goddess Durga Bhawani
at holy places, mainly the holy rivers, as the moon waxed to its full size high up in the
sky.
Theology Professor Dr Ram Chandra Gautam explains the
tradition thus: "Jamaras are disposed only at holy places like river, trees and any
other sacred places--clean and holy places because these are the remnants of the offerings
made to the goddess of power and prosperity."
Many devout women also fast during the day and pray for
Goddess Mahalaxmi (the goddess of wealth). It is widely believed that such a hard penance
would bring the goddess to their house, which means more wealth and prosperity.
"I am fasting and staying awake the whole night to
welcome the goddess to my house," said, Rekha Sharma, a housewife from Kalankisthan,
as she decorated her Pujakotha featuring a large portrait of goddess Mahalaxmi at her
house.
And it’s not only the women who fast. Even men stay
awake all the night to welcome the goddess. While the women folks spend the night offering
prayers to the goddess, their male counterparts play cards and gamble.
Legends have it that goddess Laxmi came to see the earth from
Baikuntha (heaven) in the night of full moon. However, when she landed it was already
mid-night on the earth with all the people gone to bed and there was no light.
Then she went in search of a house where there was light and
the house where people were awake. In a short while she located a house with burning
light. It belonged to a poor farmer. The goddess was apparently pleased to find a house
with light, and she rewarded the poor farmer with wealth and property. Then onwards the
full moon night is observed as Kojagrat Poornima.
Newars of the Valley have their own tradition and style.
"There is a very old tradition among the Newar communities, according to which, they
lit oil lamps on the top of a bamboo stick to make sure that the path leading to their
houses is perfectly visible," says Hari Ram Joshi, a culture expert.
Whatever the colours and importance of the tradition, the
younger generation are shying away from all these practices. "But modernisation has
led to some sort of societal transformation and few members of the younger generation are
keen to follow or respect such traditions and cultures, " laments Joshi.
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