The festival of Sri Krishna Janmashtami or Sri Krishna Jayanti is noted for the Dahi Handi breaking ceremony in Maharashtra . In 2012, date of Dahi Handi is August 10. Sri Krishna Jayanti is on August 21 in Maharashtra. Dahi Handi is a perfect amalgamation of sport and spirituality and provides youngsters an opportunity to be adventurous and to show team spirit and unity. Young boys and girls make human pyramids to break the earthen pot hanging high above and the attempt to break the pot is accompanied by the chanting of ‘Govinda ala re’ and by loud sounds of cymbals and drums.
Dahi Handi is observed a day after Gokulashtami or Janmashtami. The festival is also known as ‘Gopal kala’. The name comes from a dish or a mixture of yoghurt, pounded rice 
and jaggery, which is offered to Krishna on the day. The same mixture is placed in the Dahi Handi pot.
and jaggery, which is offered to
Legend has it that Sri Krishna was very fond of curd and butter. He and his friends used steal butter from the houses in Vrindavan. To save their curd and butter from Sri Krishna and his friends, women used to keep it in a pot and hung it from the ceiling of their houses so that it could not be easily reached. But Krishna and his friends used to form human pyramid and easily steal the milk products. Taking inspiration from this ‘leela’ divine play of Lord Krishna, today the same challenge is posed before youngsters in the form of Dahi Handi by women.
The Dahi Handi pot which is hung at a considerable height is an open challenge to the young boys in the area. The pot contains Dahi poha – a mixture of beaten rice (poha), curd, sugar and pickle. The pot is also decorated with flowers and currency notes. The young boys in the region form human pyramids, sometimes reaching up to eleven stories, to reach the pot.
Women and girls won’t allow the young boys to get the Dahi Handi pot easily; they splash water on the boys and try to break the pyramids.
Today, Dahi Handi is a major event in major cities and towns in Maharashtra and involves lot of money and large crowds. Prize for breaking the Dahi Handi pot ranges from 1000 Rupees to 2 million rupees.
9 comments:
I went to Understanding Hinduism – Hindu Religion Basics for Beginners and what I saw there at the beginning of the page was How to convert to Islam.(an ad) I mean you may be open minded and secular but it disturbed me to see it on your otherwise informative Hindu site. Is there no way not to include it on your website? Is it posted by google and u can do nothing about it?
The Ads are placed by Google and i can do little about it. I will have to completely remove all advertisements and this will create a finance crunch on the money needed for the hosting and maintenance of site.
But such things happen in all sites. For example you will get an advertisement about Bhagavad Gita in a Islam site.
And personally i feel there is nothing wrong in learning about each other. It will help in removing lot of misunderstandings.
I really think the dahi handi ceremony, the festivals in Kerala, Ganesha festival in Maharashtra are very very important. These are key events that bring the youth out as youth, provide a zest in the religion and community and make being within a great experience. Towns like Bangalore have little of this and that I do not like. There is not much youthfullness, except in bits and pieces. For that, Mumbai and Pune are great cities. Recently I was in Bangkok and participated 3 days in the Songkran festival - the energy, pounding and benevolence among the entire public was almost the best community experience I have ever experienced in my life.
Very informative. Thanks for posting.
Incidentally, I had a similar problem on my blog with the ads. In Adsense, there should be a way to block certain links, but that means (when I did it two years ago) you have to get the link from your site, click it, cut and paste it in the right place in the adsense account. This was effective for me. Muslim ads on Hindu site is not too bad, but I was getting really bad ads because of hosting stories like 'Indian dress code for Ladies in the temples' etc. The problem was almost cleared since then. I also took out the photo/image ads and left only text links.
One more comment, today I learned of another festival in Maharasthra for newly married ladies, I think called Mangala Gour. Can you do a write up on it? I am very curious to know more. Thanks.
@Jennifer - i no longer bother about adsense. It is a source of income that keeps the site floating.
@Jennifer - Sure i will try to find more about Mangala Gour and write about it.
I am not much aware about the Indian festivals and Indian costumes. So I have decided to wear a Indian costume in Halloween 2011. Please suggest me some Indian costumes.
Thanks for the informative blog.
We recently celebrated Dahi handi in California- USA. IT was fun. Check out 90 seconds video
bit.ly/dahihandi.
Also got this from another site - the spiritual significance of Dahi Handi (http://www.boldsky.com/yoga-spirituality/faith-mysticism/2010/dahi-handi-janmashtami-krishna-jayanti-020910.html)
The pot is the ego or the sense of the body mind identification that dangles in the grasp of Samsara. The butter or Dahi which forms the content is embodied as the essence, or the being. The Lord breaks the pot or the ego to release the content from the binding Samsara. His eagerness to savour it reveals the bliss that one enjoys on realising the true essence or the true self.
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