Gudhi Padwa and Ugadi: How the festivals are celebrated

Gudhi Padwa celebrations in Maharashtra.

India celebrates today the traditional new year -- Gudhi Padwa in Maharashtra and Goa and Ugadi or Yugadi in Karnataka, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. Celebrations comprise prayers and feasts.

Gudhi Padwa marks the arrival of the spring season. It is connected to the mythical day of the creation of the universe by Lord Brahma.

Gudhi Padwa also marks Lord Rama’s coronation in Ayodhya. On the day of the festival, devotees tie long silk cloths on bamboo sticks. Flower garlands and leaves of neem and mango are also attached to bamboos. On top, kalash (bronze or bamboo pots) are placed as markers of victory. This arrangement is called “Gudhi”.

Families celebrating the festival decorate their homes with rangoli and dress up in new clothes for gatherings. They prepare dishes combining the bitter neem and sweet jaggery as a reminder of mixed experiences in life. Shrikhand and Puran Poli are also on the menu.

Read: Happy Gudi Padwa: Food traditions chefs follow at home

In Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, Ugadi is marked with ritual showers and prayers. The special festive dish prepared in these states is called “pacchadi” – an amalgamation of sweet, sour, salty, spicy and bitter flavours. Tamarind paste, neem flowers, brown sugar or sweet jaggery green chilli, raw mango and table salt are used for the dish.

“The simple dish reminds the people that the following year -- as all of life -- will consist of not just sweet experiences, but a combination of sweet, sour, salty, and bitter episodes,” says a paper published in the Journal of Hindu- Christian Studies. “Just as the different substances are bound together, one is reminded that no event or episode is wholly good or bad. Even in the midst of bitter experiences, there are sweet moments. One is also reminded that the experience of taste is transitory and ephemeral; so too, is life, and one has to learn to put pain and pleasure in proper temporal perspective.”