The festival of love, peace, felicity! The pleasant knock-knock of a beautiful festival arrives; the festival to celebrate the most treasured relationship between a sister and a brother. Raksha Bandhan it is, the simplicity and rapture in a sister’s eyes and the brother’s heart pounding exhilaration. Basically, Raksha Bandhan is a Hindu festival that celebrates the love and duty between brothers and sisters; the festival is also popularly used to celebrate any brother-sister like loving protective relationship between men and women who are relatives or biologically unrelated. the girl ties a beautiful sacred colourful thread around the wrist of her brother and prays for his long life and exceeding happiness for him. The festival falls on the full moon day (Shravan Poornima) of the Shravan month of the Hindu Calender.
The brother, on the other hand, gives to her sister gifts and also promises to take care of his sister lifelong. This relation has a totally different angle in our life. It is evidently most celebrated festival in India but there are many countries which celebrate this festival like their own. Basically, Raksha Bandhan is not related just to one religion but is universal as it is the most genuine and generous relationship between a male and a female regardless of their biological relation. The sense of purity and the sense of making a person one’s confidant makes this festival a blessing in disguise.
There was a custom in olden days, to write letters to the brother expressing the feelings and emotions in the sister’s heart. The letter used to be a huge one, with a lot of information about family whereabouts and also a lot of love and blessings. It was like a mediator to make a direct soul to soul connection. Sister used to send her favourite postcards with a the sacred thread and a pinch of Kumkum ( that is a powder used for social and religious markings in India. It is either made from turmeric or saffron. The turmeric is dried and powdered with a bit of slaked lime, which turns the rich yellow powder into a red color). There used to be a time when all sisters were alike and peace and prosperity was the main objective of this festival.
Raksha Bandhan, in my perspective, is an occasion to celebrate the worldly brotherhood and sisterhood. It is an occasion to commemorate the existence of love and gratitude for each other and to felicitate each other for balancing the two genders in an exclusively efficient manner. It is a day to observe the beauty of true friendship and courteousness. The solemn occasion plays a vital role in recreating all the fun childhood memories, the fights and unlimited quarrels, the long walks and intense talks about future, the games with a lot of cheating and melodrama from both the sides, the covering for each other when parents would get upset on one of them; the relation between a sister and her brother is beyond expression as it is so pure, it cannot be named or given a title. It is one of the deepest understanding one can ever create in their heart, as is created in this relationship.
The importance of this relation has increased manifold due to the ever increasing anti-social activities these days in our society. All girls aren’t just girl’s but precious blessings to their brothers too. The vulnerability of them has swollen to mammoth proportions. A brother doesn’t seem to be just protective to his sister but rather he wants to be a Super-human due to the extraordinarily harmful atmosphere in the vicinity. Sometimes, I somehow feel that this festival is a somewhat celebration of relief for those brothers whose sisters are protected from all social evils bullying the society lately. It is quite unfortunate for those sisters though, the brothers of whom have been the convicted ones in the anti-social propaganda.
I try very hard not to bring up topics like these between a pleasant read however I cannot stop myself from establishing such obnoxious yet real situations deteriorating the society. How bothered, actually how disappointed and disgusted would a sister feel with these news all over the place. It would be a matter of shame but mostly a matter of loss of the greatest relation. The trust, the understanding, the confidence and love, everything just gets destroyed in a moment! A sister becomes a girl, just one other girl; disoriented, despondent, crestfallen!
A brother is the strength of a girl and a sister is the soul of a boy. In our society, it is an imperative notion to not just love but also respect each other’s gender. The imbalance and unfortunate environment is somewhere down the line a result of the absence of respect too. However, I have read many cases of molestation of girls done by their own brothers, which wasn’t just shocking but disastrous and I just couldn’t associate with that thought as, if I would have even tried to do so i would have ended up being sick and traumatized! I could never really do any analysis about this kind of social evil existing in our society as the sense of fear always trapped me in the cob-web of anguish and mental torture.
Ergo, this solemn occasion, I pray to God to give all the brothers the sense of responsibility towards all the sisters in our country. That pledge, we used chatter in school, had a tremendous meaning to impart. It is my humble request to all the brothers and sisters of our nation, to pray for the peace and justice of this festival. This time the celebration needs the mode of extravaganza which can only come into existence when trust, confidence, love and protection are developed in each of us from within. A very hearty Raksha Bandhan to all !
– Asawari Savarikar
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