Chaitra Navratri Kanjak Ashtami Puja – Young Girls worshipped as Goddess

Kanjak Ashtami puja is an important ritual during the Chaitra Navratri or Vasant Navratras. It falls on the eighth day – the Ashtami day – of the nine-day Navratri festival. A young girl child (Kanjaks) is worshipped on this day in North India. In 2013, the date of Kanjak Ashtami is marked on April 18.

On the day people invite young girls to their homes and wash their feet and tie red color thread on their wrists. A tika is applied on the girl child’s forehead and worship them as Mother Goddess. The family members take blessing from the young child by touching their feet. The children are given ‘prasad,’ gifts and some money.

Some of the regions in India that observe Kanjak Ashtami are Chandigarh, Haryana, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh.

But sadly these places are notorious for sex-determination tests and the subsequent abortion of female fetuses.

In fact, many households find it hard to get a girl child for puja during Kanjak Ashtami.

No Bhagavad Gita or No incarnation can change the mindset of such people, who one day worship the girl child and on another day abort a female fetus without any consideration.