HOLI : The Festival of Colors

Across the globe, spring is the time of color, revelry and new beginnings. In snow-ridden countries, there are festivals that celebrate the onset of spring, that's their little patch of sunshine, for just a few months. Like everything else about the culture of India, Holi too has a history of a few thousand years.

In its literal sense, Holi, the word, signifies the act of burning. The night before colors are celebrated, there is a public bonfire that is supposed to use all our base desires and evils in each of us, as its fuel. The story goes that a few thousand years ago, there lived a demon king in India, Hiranyakashyap. His younger brother had been killed by one of the Gods- Vishnu - and he wanted revenge. He played havoc with the three worlds, the earth, heaven and the nether world, till the Gods could take it no more. This king had a pious young son named Prahlad, who was an ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu. Much to his father’s chagrin, the young boy continued in his devotion, and the father ultimately planned to kill his son. In this venture he asked his sister Holika (another demon), for help. She had been granted a boon of immortality, and immunity from fire, so they planned for her to sit on a pyre with Prahlad on her lap, hoping he would be burnt to ashes. But Prahlad’s powers of devotion actually reduced Holika to ashes. This event is relived every year, right from those days, and it is believed that a burning bonfire takes away all our evils, like Holika.

The actual celebration however has very different connotations. It is not about religion, spirituality or gravity, but only about fun, frolicking and flirting. Yes, Hinduism must be the only religion (if at all) in the world that boasts of Gods that flirt and openly flaunt their human nature with its pitfalls too.

Around the time of the year when winters in North India recede and the warmth of the day increase, a young boy would play with the girls and other milk maidens of his village, drenching their clothes with colored water, breaking their pots so they could do little to save themselves. This young boy was Lord Krishna, who lived in the North Western province of Braj, in India, about 4500 years ago. He was known to be an incarnation of Lord Vishnu, and made no bones about his power. At the same time, it did not make him grave or vain. Krishna is the quintessential young man, with an eye for babes and a yen for butter. Right from childhood, he was known to steal butter and curds from their community kitchens, and the women of the village were indulgent enough to let him. The woman he was in love with, Radha, was a married milkmaid but that never deterred him from his flirting or seducing.

His pranks grew with his age, and then it was the turn of the village girls to be seduced. Holi, was devised by Krishna as an official day when every boy could tease any girl he wanted, the gravity of every relationship would be dissolved in the pots of colored water, and in short, everybody could let their hair down. In the traditional society where girls and boys were kept completely apart, Holi was one day when every young heart danced with happiness. The festival, thus, was not about spirituality, but about life. Or maybe, it was the wise ways of Krishna, who believed in living life well, was no ascetic himself, that he encouraged this kind of public displays of celebration, to ensure a peaceful community life, a harmonious relationship between sexes and an outlet to pent up frustrations. Whatever may have been the case, it worked.

And today, thousands of years later, his descendents celebrate the festival in the same manner. Over the years, colors have changed, they used to be vegetable dyes, now there are all varieties of pigments available, harmful and sometimes very harmful for the skin, …there’s paint, there are all kinds of lead based pigments, but the color lives on.

Just as Holi added color to Krishna’s love life it adds to the lives of Indians today. The festival has spread to the entire country, even to areas that, in Krishna’s days, had Dravidian cultures (the South) and the East of the country (where the inhabitants were Mongol races). Over the last 4500 years, Holi has become one of India’s main festivals. However, in Vraj, where Krishna started it, it has a life of its own. Traditionally on Holi, in the town of Barsana, in the same area, women (far suppressed and terribly oppressed), cover their heads and hide their faces and beat their men folk with long wooden sticks. This activity starts a week before the actual festival, and the best part is, men cannot retaliate! At all!! Men have to resort to padded clothes, and also manage to escape, for if they get caught by the females of the town, they are lead away, thrashed, made to dress in feminine clothes and dance!! Takes care of all the ire that women had over the last year, and this opportunity gives them the freedom of expressing their frustration, all in good faith, of course. In some ways this is more torturous for the men than the bull fights of Spain, at least they don’t have to seek a bride from among the bulls one day!!!! Here they do!

The next day, there are clouds of color, as men take their own out in catching the women and coloring them at will. Traditional dyes are used, especially those made from the flame of the forest flower, called `palaash’ or, `tesu’ in this region. It is only on the following day that the rest of the country celebrates Holi, in a much milder and meek manner. Everyone just splashes colored water over everyone else, eats and drinks like there’s no tomorrow, and in many parts of the country, goes on a drugged high, In Varanasi, the ancient seat of Indian Hindu culture, devotees of Lord Shiva use this occasion to get a shot at bhang (opium), and revel under its sopoforic influence. That is another intoxicating Holi!!!