“Oh its a Monday morning work today is going to hurt”, I thought. But, can it be evaded? Can it be postponed? Well how fortunate it would have been! Just then I heard the horn and rushed for the cab. We started on our way to office, on the way I found Hyderabad roads were looking different they are not the same, they never looked this bad, papers scattered everywhere with many stuck to the tar as a gum. The roads looked utter messy with no cleanliness found throughout the stretch and throughout our drive! What might have gone wrong? Why it looks so messy? Then a thought struck me, “Oh it was Ganesh Nimajjanam yesterday “, but then I thought “So what? We all like to celebrate it; we all associate ourselves with Ganapati from our childhood more than any other God. But I also know that cleanliness is next to godliness and will God accept what we have done?”
While I was returning home we took the Tank Bund road and I was surprised to see how depleted it looked, it was looking no less than a left over after the floods. It was depressing to see a iconic road of Hyderabad, which is symbolized, to be a bonding between the twin cities now was lying unattended, marred with the debris. Was this avoidable? Yes it was certainly! With little consciousness and compassion from our side towards our city. How justified we are in destroying the infrastructure of which we are only a custodian and which needs to be passed to the future generations? Why does only the roads display the gloomy look, why doesn’t the same is repeated back at our homes? Since we care about everything that is ours and in that case even this city is ours, how can we ruin it?
Every year before the festival we hear people talking about using clay instead of plaster of paris and natural colors and they make honest efforts to motivate us! But do we ever heed to their concerns? They are genuinely concerned about the wealth that the nature has given to us and we are genuinely bent upon destroying it. We hear people talking about Musi in Hyderabad how it looked then and how it is now. But why don’t we realize that it might happen to Hussain Sagar as well, though we know it well we don’t care for it! We have to care for it if we have to save ourselves from the backlash of the future generations.
Water is considered to be life, life was born in water and is still striving on water; it is the precious gift that nature has given to every living being, so do we have the right to destroy it for our selfish intents? How fortunate it would have been if animals and plants were able to speak for them! It’s a scary thought to think how in future we might be saying; “There used to be a lake here” pointing at Tank Bund, isn’t it scary to even think? We Hindus consider water to be sacred and one among the five godly gifts, then how can we think to pollute it with harmful substances? I am as Hindu as anyone or more religious than people who dance in disdain while the god idol is being pushed off the cliff into the water and celebrate while he melts and whistles while nothing godly is left behind. I fail to understand this form of prayer; instead we can have better forms of showing our devotion towards the God. Today we dance while the environment is getting polluted, day is not far when the same environment will make us dance under the scorching sun.
Ganesh Nimajjanam was initiated by, Shri. Bal Gangadhar Tilak, though we had festivities earlier but the tradition of installation of the idol during the prayer days and then dissolving it into the water was his initiative. When he started this he had an honest motive of bridging the gap between the Brahmins and Non-Brahmins and to spread brotherhood and goodness among the society and it was also a strategic move against the British, a move that helped in social gatherings which was not allowed by the British. Today, what motive do we have in following this tradition? Do we have the same social conditions still prevalent? Or are we really able to bridge gap between the communities? Today different communities are organizing the Ganesh Pandals in the closed quarters among their social class. I saw a hoarding in Hyderabad by most prominent politician inviting VIP’s to the Ganesh Chaturti Celebrations; do you still think that we are spreading brotherhood in the name of Ganesh Nimajjanam or we thickening the divide?
We bring in the Idol with great devotion; pray only for some days since we cannot continue the same sacredness throughout the year, we restrict it to only few days. Then we have found a way to dispose the Idol through submerging in water. If we ponder on it we would know, how selfish we are! We neither pray all days nor do we pay a respectful homage to the God and we know what we are upto with the mother earth! And yes we have right for all this, yes because no one questions us, yes because the animals and plants cant stop us and yes because I don’t listen to my consciousness! If you had a thought on this, why don’t we establish the Idol throughout the year at our homes and offer our prayers all the days.
And if your answer was a - No, we only care about the tradition! Then lets atleast take a owe that next Ganesh Chaturti will be harm less, will be free of plaster of paris and free of harmful colors, will unite us all in the name of humanity forgetting the dividing factor called social class and community!
- Harish Bheemarthi
1 comment:
Just wanted to bring to ur notice that its not Ganesh Nimarjan but Ganesh Murthi nimarjan.
i Agree with you, people should just use clay or mud idols without color. this is how it had started off in the first place n this is exactly how it has to end. Deviation from the original method has brought about such disasters.
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