The cleaning up of water bodies, the way it is done before this festival, is a concept very relevant to today’s times.
Nowadays, a large number of intellectual, creative and business minds of the country are striving to create a mass movement to protect nature.
But, despite their best efforts, they have not made much headway in this direction.
It would do them well if they took a second look at Chhath — a festival which is celebrated by the people of Bihar and which is an occasion that draws out a sea of people to the banks of rivers to clean up the mess there every year and that too, without any marketing or publicity gimmicks.
For two days, all that the people do during Chhath is to respect Mother Nature in a pious way. This is one of the traditional festivals of the ancient Indian state and its sole purpose is the worship of nature.
Chhath has been explained in old gazetteers of British India as a festival celebrated in Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh. In the Rig Veda and Mahabharata, there are several contexts of worshiping the sun.
However, myth says that Karna, the son of the sun god in Mahabharata started the practice of Chhath. Whatever be the reasons for its beginnings, this festival is basically a celebration of nature, especially the sun.
And for long the sun has been considered by man to be the one and only source of energy.
Every year after Diwali, Biharis engage themselves in cleaning up the rivers or ponds, wherever they are. Their biggest festival of the year has a tradition where they offer prayers to sunset and sunrise and it has to be done on the edge of a river or pond. Over the years, due to large scale migration, Chhath has crossed state and national boundaries.
Today, this festival is highly relevant, if you observe it closely. The Indian government is spending crores of rupees for cleaning up rivers and ponds, but it hasn't been able to generate much change. The fact is, we have overlooked the important role that rivers play in our lives. Governments and intellectuals depend on UN charters and the like to save water and clean up rivers.
Chhath has no science probably but it has got logics enough to explain the
importance of nature and the greatness of the rivers where ancient civilisations prospered.
The festival also bans machine processes to make edibles. Even prasads can't be cooked on coal or LPG stoves.
A few years ago some American youths from the cultural group, 'Best for Next,' had made a documentary on the celebrations of Chhath on the bank of the Ganga, Gandak, Koshi and Punpun.
These Americans were amazed to see thousands of devotees doing everything in their power to keep the rivers clean. But do we need foreigners to show us the wisdom of our ancient culture?
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