Holi: the Celebration of Colors

As you should already know Indian culture is known as full festivals, religious and traditions. This paper is going to talk about the traditions and the festival call “Holi” which is also known as the festival of colors, worldwide. Holi is the spring festival of colors that is the second most important Hindu/Punjabi festival of India after the Diwali. This festival is full of fun with parties, traditional foods, and bonfires. Holi is celebrated with people smearing colors with each other, and uses balloons filled with water.

It’s celebrated a bit differently from state to state in India, especially well liked in the city of Mathura in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, because of the birth and the childhood of Lord Krishna. (Fieldhouse, 2017, p.271). Holi is an earliest festival whose name came from Holika, known as the wicked demon sister of King Hiranyakashipu. People then say that Holika tricked the king’s son into sitting on a burning pyre as the punishment for worshipping Lord Vishnu instead of his father.

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Through the interference of Vishnu, the son was saved, and Holika was burned. (Fieldhouse, 2017, p.271). Holi is celebrated with a large bonfires or fires that are lit up in village parks or temples and the statue of Holika are burned while all the people that are celebrating sings and dances around the fire. Holi is also known as the time of forgiveness of injustice and having a fresh new start in life. End of the day of Holi friends and families exchanges traditional Indian sweets and gifts after the full day of riot with colors.

“Only inhabitants of the southern states of India do not mark this festival. Comes on the full moon day of the month Phalguna, February– March. (Panda, 2002, p.542).

After knowing all the fun with colors and balloons that people have in the festival of Holi, imagine how good the traditional food would be that people prepare for this festival. Popular known delicacies are gujias, puraan poli, and malpua, these are prepared and served in the house to friends and families. All these sweets and all the other types of sweets can also be bought from the sweet shops. During this time all these sweets are prepared days before in the shops or home, so you can give them out to your friends and families. Puraan poli is a Maharashtrian sweet that is made with flatbread with a chickpea paste filling and sweetened with jaggery, a kind of sugar. (Fieldhouse, 2017, p.271). Malpua made with fresh wheat/white bread soaked in a sugar syrup or Jaggery and Gujias which are made with flour patties stuffed with thick milk, sugar, almonds, and raisins and then deep-fried. (Philip, 2003, p.201). This is the main food that is associated with Holi, and people tend to eat it in the morning, afternoon and dinner there is no time for this during this festival of colors. As we know this festival is a celebration in honoring of the lord Krishna’s defeat of the evil Holika. During the celebration of Holi in many towns, some social roles are reserved, Pongal in south India, Baisakhi in the state of Punjab and Onam in Kerala are known as the festivals of harvest. Numbers of Hindus also celebrate the birthday of the important gods, Rama, Ganesh, and Krishna. People tend to light candles, lamps and lit up fireworks during Diwali, the festival of lights. This festival is also known as one of the biggest festivals of India, its dedicated to Lakshmi the god of wealth. (Baltutis, 2015, p.96).