Rajasthan: How Diwali celebrations have gone light years ahead

Every generation has its own unique recipe of going about things. From how we dress up to how we celebrate festivals, there is marked shift the way our grandparents used to mark such occasions and the way younger generation indulges in revelry. 

Unlike his parents or grandparents, for Abhimanyu Bansal, the festival of lights is more about the family get together. “While my dad used to burst a lot of crackers, me and my friends burst only a few just for the purpose of shagun as we are more aware of the pollution caused by the firecrackers,” he said, adding while they used to play cards, we play poker during the celebrations. He added that the gap gets more underscored by the fact that his generation is more fond of chocolates and assorted desserts rather than Indian sweets.  

Talking about the transition, Abhimanyu’s father Raj Bansal who is a film distributor, said, “For my mother (Kanta Bansal) Diwali was about making diyas. She used to make them herself and paint them as well. There weren’t as many firecrackers as now, but my parents used to burst as many variety of crackers, that were available during those times. For them, Diwali was also about making rangoli with colours like gulal. She also made Diwali sweets at home.” 

Sharing about how he used to celebrate Diwali, he said, “During my school days, we had 100s of guests walking in for Diwali, so the festival was assisting my mother for the decorations and helping her in serving the guests.

However, in my college days, we used to burst a lot of crackers with family and friends. The festival was about going around to look at the decorations and lights around the city and playing cards with friends. We still get kilos of flowers to make rangolis in the entire house.” 

The storyline is similar in most households. Sixty five-year-old Vikram Singh Bakhtia who is a resident of Jhotwara told DNA that, “All the people of the village used to celebrate Diwali together in the olden times. Our village Banethi is in the Kotputli tehsil of Jaipur district. We still miss the celebration we had as kids. It had a lot of warmth.”Reminiscing the experience of Diwali shopping, Bakhtia added that the fun is missing with people having an easy access to everything on online portals. 

Making sweets at home is now a thing of past as with everyone involved in rat race of the professional world, millenials are too tired to indulge in cooking. This is one habit that the elders are finding difficult to come to terms with. Shanti Devi, a resident of Walled City, shared that all the women of her family used to make various mithais and dishes on Diwali and every preparation involved great deal of attention.