South Asian perception New Year festival in Bangladesh

Lionel Wijesiri

Aluth Avurudu has become an important national festival for both the cultures of the Sinhalese Buddhists and the Tamil Hindu Sri Lankans, and is unique as such, as it is not celebrated in the same manner elsewhere in the world.

Both Sinhala and Tamil calendar begins with the same date which is observed by most traditional calendars of some of the States in India as in Assam, Bengal, Kerala, Manipur, Orissa and Punjab.

Poila Boishakh

In Tamilnadu, from the year 2009 the Tamil new year was celebrated on the first day of Thai (usually January 14) by supporters of the DMK and affiliated political parties. However, this legislative enactment was not without controversy.)

The countries like Bangladesh, Nepal, Burma, Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand, too, celebrate their New Year along with us. Two years ago, I’ve had the privilege of visiting Bangladesh to reflect on the Bengali New Year or Poila Bo ishakh.

It has been one of the happiest experiences in my life. My host, Akash Rahman, Senior Lecturer of a University, guided me throughout the customs , traditions and the history of Bangladesh New Year.

Customs

New Year’s festivities are closely linked with rural life in Bengal. People bathe early in the morning and dress in fine clothes and then go to visit relatives, friends and neighbours. Special foods are prepared to entertain guests. Baishakhi fairs are arranged in many parts of the country.

Various agricultural products, traditional handicrafts, toys, cosmetics as well as various kinds of food and sweets are sold at these fairs.

The fairs also provide entertainment, with singers and dancers singing folk songs. Narrative plays like laily-Majnu, Yusuf- Zukekha and Radha-Krishna are staged. Among other attractions of these fairs are puppet shows and merry-go-rounds.

On the last day of Chaitra, the last month of the Bengali calendar, farmers’ wives prepare amani by soaking green mango and rice in a large earthen vessel.

Hot summer

A leafy mango twig is also placed in the vessel. At dawn everybody eats the soaked rice while the water in the vessel is sprinkled on his or her bodies with the help of the mango twig. They believe this keeps the body cool in the hot summer. Under the Mughals, who ruled most of the Indian Subcontinent by the late 17th and early 18th centuries, agricultural taxes were collected according to the Hijri calendar.

However, as the Hijri calendar is a lunar calendar, the agricultural year does not coincide with the fiscal.

As a result, farmers were hard-pressed to pay taxes out of season. In order to streamline tax collection, the Mughal Emperor Akbar ordered a reform of the calendar. Accordingly, Fatehullah Shirazi, a renowned scholar and astronomer, formulated the Bangla Calendar on the basis of the Bangla solar calendars.

In the Bengali New Year, people hug each other with warmth-filled hearts and greet ‘Subho Nabo Borsho’, which in Bengali means Happy New Year. The whole of Bangladesh celebrates irrespective of any regional or religious differences in this event.

Historically, it was the custom to be clear up all debts and dues on the last day of the Bengali month of ‘Chaitro’, which is the last day of a Bengali year.

The idea was to begin the New Year in a new and fresh manner without any backlogs.

On the next day of the New Year, the landlords would distribute sweets among the tenants.

The same custom is maintained even today. The businesspersons especially all kinds of shopkeepers perform puja to welcome the New Year.

The main event of the day was to open a halkhata or new book of accounts. In villages, towns and cities, traders and businessmen closed their old account books and opened new ones. They used to invite their customers to share sweets and renew their business relationship with them. This tradition is still practiced.

Pahela Baishakh

Observance of Pahela Baishakh has become popular in the cities. Early in the morning, people gather under a big tree or on the bank of a lake to witness the sunrise.

Artistes present songs to welcome the New Year. People from all walks of life wear traditional Bengali dresses: young women wear white saris with red borders and adorn themselves with bangles and flowers. Men wear white pyjamas or dhoti and kurta. Many start the day with the traditional breakfast of panta bhat (cooked rice soaked with water), green chillies, onion, and fried hilsha fish.

Akash says, “In the end I may say that Pahela Baishakh is a day when we take a look at our roots. We do something different to observe the day. We wear special dress, we eat special food and we hear our favourite songs.

“It is the day when we take a fresh vow to protect our culture, our language and everything else that makes us Bengali. On this day everyone looks at the elders for guidance and leadership.

“Pahela Boishakh is not only be a mere set of festivity. Its essence carries all through in our urban culture, our literature, our art and architecture and in our overall psyche.” I thanked Akash for sharing his memories of Pahela Baishakh with me. When I left him at his flat it was late in the evening. As the afternoon rain had washed away some signs of urban blemishes, nature looked greener and sparkling once again.