Yesterday was the Jyeshtha Pournina. Traditionally, it is associated with a fast women are supposed to keep. Typically, there are two responses; women who keep the "vrat" and women who disdain it
The first category includes high profile celebrities as well. Rather like the "karva chouth" of the North Indians, both, the celebrity wives and their normal counterparts, deck up a lot, and follow the ritual religiously. The other group is environmentally conscious and considers hence the botanically cruel and heartless ritual very patriarchal.
Without going/getting extremist either way, how does one 're-vision' the 'vrat', the fast, the religious rituals related to the holy occasion? Long time back, as a twenty-one year old, while teaching my first ever M.A. batch wherein most students were much older, i had thus tried to analyse the Savitri phenomenon differently.
In my opinion, she is highly intelligent, intellectual and learned. She seems to know the properties of trees, for instance. Every Botany beginner knows the scientifically established fact that the bunyan tree is both, inherently medicinal and an ecological center. Given her choice, how about granting her such awareness even during those mythical days?
Her story, moreover, shows that she makes her own choices, stands for/by them despite every attempt to dissuade her. No wonder, she finds "re-solutions" to existential issues that seem to threaten her very identity.
The famous boon she asks for shows her smartness and infinite wisdom. Just a single utterance is enough for her to re-gain the lost kingdom as the lineage for her son. Hers is the re-vision that gets back a dethroned king's sight/site. She is strength incarnate indeed! Her 'boon' shows that she is, moreover, excellent at communication strategies, right?
Well, can it be thus said that allocating new and contemporary meanings to traditional tales makes them more worthy of respect rather than merely following a custom that goes down generations? Any response to my argument?
Oh, yes, that reminds me of my resolve to read Aurobindo's eponymous verse epic!
Pratima@ 'What oft was narrated, but never so well explained' can be the definition, i suppose, of aware interpretations and conscious/conscientious behaviour patterns as well. What say?
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