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Sudhir
Chandra Dawn for Bardhaman
Dot Com News Bureau
Burdwan, 19 June 04 :
The Rathayatra, or the chariot festival is a sacred and remarkable festival of the Hindus. The festival occurs, in the Ashar
month of the Bengali calender i.e. in the rainy season. The main festival is performed in a grand manner at Puri
in Orissa.
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Following this, the festival is celebrated at Bardhaman around and out side. In the middle of seventeenth century during Mughal period, Abu Rai, a businessman from Lahore Ksharri Kotli Mahalla was awarded to Chaudury post being
in charge of Rekabibazaar and thus this family settled at old Bardhaman town from Kanchannagar to Baikunthapur. The Burdwan Raj family was very much devoted to the gods and goddesses like Krishna, Radhika, Balaram, Shiva, Chandi etc. On this tradition, the then king Raja Kirti Chand started this chariot festival at Kanchanngar maidan in the year 1730-1734 A.D. There were two chariots at Kanchannagar, one of the king and the other of the queen. The chariot of Maharaja and chariot of Maharani, both were made of wood, the chariot of the king is higher than that of the queen's. The height of the former is about 30ft where as the later is of about 28 ft high. Both the chariots were decorated with colourful painting, garlands, flowers and idols. The idols depicted the incarnations of Lord Krishna and most of them were made to reflect the supernatural powers and activities of Krishna's boyhood. On the day of car festival, Lord Jagannath were placed at the top of the chariot and pulled by hundreds of men. The chariots had wooden horses
infront and the cars were set on eight big wheels. When those cars were drawn from Kanchannagar the people shouted with joy and trumpets, flutes and drums were blown and beaten.
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The king's family came down to the road with common people as they believed that, they would be freed from sorrows and sufferings. After fifteen days, Lord Jagannath came back which is called punarjatra. On this occasion, fairs are held in many places. Various things like sweets, toys, fruits, flutes made of bamboos, earthen utensils etc. were sold. Thousands and thousands assembled to observe this festival.
In Bardhaman district, many ancient chariots are still drawn today like that of Makar, Bankapasi, Kuchut, Kulingram and Kalna. The rathajatra festival of Kulingram is memorable by the advent of Sri Chaityanya Mahapravu. He came to this village with his follower Ramananda Basu, the son of great poet Maladhar Basu who wrote a great Padavali verse named `Sri Krishna Vijay'. It was told that unless and until
'Paltodari' ( a rope made of seven coloured threads) were brought by the Basu family from Kulingram to Puri, Jagannath's chariot would have not been started to draw. This custom was started on the devotion of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu but now with the absence of successor of by
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Ramananda Basu family at
Kulingram, the custom has been abolished, but Rathajatra festival is still now held. This is the ancient festival of Bengal.
At Kalna, the Rathajatra festival is held with the help of Govt. S.D.O., the custodian of Lord Jagannath, Balaram and Subhadra now-a-days. Maharaja of Bardhaman made Kalna the second capital and as such they made their royal palace in Kalna and started the rathjatra festival in Kalna. The images were made of `Austha Dhatu', a valuable alloy of eight metals. The images of Jagannath, Subhadra, and Balaram were stolen by thieves, in about 40 years ago. Although it was recovered, the matter went to the court, but after that, the representatives of the royal family did not agree to establish the metal idols fearing that again it may be stolen again. They made the wooden idols and the metal idols of Jagannath, Subhadra & Balaram are kept in the government custody. Only once in year, the idols are taken out so that, common people can tribute on this holy day.
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The author is a retired head teacher of the CMS High School, Burdwan
and president of the Burdwan Rarh Sanskriti parishad. |
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