Holi

Many people associate Indian festivals with a post-harvest joyous mood, but these are essentially celebrations of Dharma or the values which hold society together in general good.

Holi is a celebration of bhakti or devotedness to the Supreme Being or simply the Being, as Dhamic spirituality does not accept the binary of the Ultimate and the immediate. Holi is a festive remembrance day of the victory of Prahlad's devotion over a demonic regime.

Holi in its form is very earthy. It is the festival of reconnecting with soil, kinfolks and others. It is about bonding and profanities, and in totality, about worldliness. It is a day of a massive pullback from transcendentalism. It is the uniqueness of Dhama that ensures a very happy blend of spirituality and living or ethereal and earthy.

Holi a Sanatani festival thus asserts the democratic spirit of the Indic traditions and living. Bhakti which Holi celebrates denies social hierarchies and the way celebrations take place cements its democratic message. It is a cultural expression of what modern sensibilities see as worldly, democratic and republicanism in place of otherworldly, hierarchic and monarchism respectively.

Holi encompasses happiness and auspiciousness. Holi greetings. No adjective with Holi.

Niraj Kumar Jha

On the Occasion of Holi

Holi is the great Sanatana festivity of mingling, and trashing distinctions and taboos. This is the periodic return to everyone's social self. In its contrast, Diwali is the statement of attainment, though not with its attendant social obligations. The great celebration of Vijayadashami, asserts the civilization's resolve to take to arms in defence of Dharma. Its uniqueness is the deification of the feminine as the fountain of chivalry. The Sanatana is the completeness of humanism and the order of justice. India is progressing to regain its essence, with which it would embrace the whole world. With Dharma's ascendance, the mankind would be in realisation of its humaneness.

Sanatana ki Jai!

- Niraj Kumar Jha