Vasant Panchami And Saraswati Puja
January 15, 2010
Vasant Panchami or Basant Panchami or Shree Panchami is celebrated every year on the fifth day (which represents the word Panchami) of the Hindu month of Magh (January- February). It is the first day of spring or Vasant Ritu or Bosonto Kal/Ritu in Bengali.
Spring season is the glorious time of the year when the sun has a new shade of yellow and the blooming flowers and flauna brings life back from the dreary, chilly winters. This day is very auspicious as Goddess Saraswati is worshipped. This festival is widely popular in the state of West Bengal and Orissa.
Goddess Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge, music and fine arts. She is the serene mother who bestows the power and strength to the mind to comprehend all forms of gyaan or knowledge. The knowledge can be in any form-acadamic, music, singing or spiritual.
The idol of goddess Saraswati is white as the milk and her magnetic eyes draw the worshippers to her lotus feet. She is the divine consort of Lord Brahma. She is dressed in white or light yellow coloured saree. Her four hands hold different objects depicting its sacred values. One hand she holds sacred scriptures, on the other a lotus, while the other two show her playing the string instrument, Veena. She is sometimes depicted as standing or seated on a white lotus. Her vahan or vehicle is the white swan and stands close to her feet.
The elegant, white swan is symbolical as well. It represents the Sattva Guna (pure and untainted quality). Only a swan can separate milk from water so the swan is trying to imbibe this quality to her devotees as well that we should all have the power to distinguish between goodness from the negative sources.
On this day, women wear yellow sarees representing the Vasant ritu or season. Students throng to the feet of the Goddess to seek her blessings so that they perform well in their examinations. They keep their textbooks and notebooks that they have difficulty in studying like mathematics, science at her feet. Some even keep writing instruments like pens, pencil, geometry sets so that it get blessed and brings them success.
Parents earnestly wait for this auspicious day because they make their little ones write their first alphabet in the presence of the divine Mother. The priest, who performs the rituals and invokes the goddess on this day, holds the hand of the little ones and helps them write an alphabet on slate with a chalk. This is an ancient tradition and still earnestly followed in the Bengali community.
Vasant / Basant Pachami is also celebrated on a large scale by Vaishnavs or Vaishnavas. Both Gaudiya Vaishnavs and Pushtimargi Vaishnavs celebrate this festival with a lot of gaiety and devotion.
These photographs taken are from the Saraswati Puja held at Bengal Club, Shivaji Park, Mumbai.
©Nayna Chakrabarty, 2007-2010. All Rights Reserved.
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