Stop doing and start Questioning...

Last week, I had been for my cousin’s wedding. It was so much fun, mainly because I din’t have much to do besides wearing designer sarees and jewelry, having fun with cousins and enjoying multi-course marriage feasts. On the eve of the wedding day, there were some small poojas. I was sitting very close to the stage and observing all the rituals. There was lot of give-n-take, Goadbharaaais, exchanging sarees and shirt/pant materials etc etc. Towards the end, my cousin (the boy) was made to sit on the chair with his feet in large plate full of saffron water. His in-laws added a few rose petals in the water and they started rubbing his (already pedicured) feet (with an expression of total devotion on their face). His father-in-law especially had a bit of difficulty in bending down but he din’t mind it. They went on performing that ritual for a few minutes before his feet were taken out of water and wiped clean with towel.

It must have been at least hundred times, that I have witnessed this custom in marriages. Even in my own marriage, I had seen my parents doing the same thing with exactly the same feelings. In every Hindu wedding a boy enjoys this foot massage (and many more similar acts) and hence the feeling of superiority that he becomes entitled for. It may not be inappropriate to say that most of the wedding ceremonies are about obliged parents thanking the boy and his family for accepting their daughter. This ritual of ‘washing feet’ is only manifestation of that.

Now don’t get my cousin wrong. He is a nice boy and I am sure he has no malice in his heart. If he would have been asked explicitly, if he enjoyed that act; I don’t think his answer would have been positive. But he simply followed the age-old practice. He din’t feel the need to question it. And that bothered me. In which generation boys are going to develop sensitivity/muster courage to stand up and declare that they find this and such similar acts atrocious and that they don’t want to be part of such non-sense anymore.. Imagine the foundation on which marriage is built- even before the girl and the boy tie the knot and start spending their life together, its told to them in every possible way that the boy is superior to the girl and she better not forget it !!

The point of discussion today is not how our society treats women. I will surely write about my views on the same. But what I want to say today, is how we have been following things blindly without checking their applicability, relevance and logic in today’s context. Our higher/better education or exposure to better civic practices hasn’t taught us that.

Take an example of how we celebrate festivals today. When the whole world is worried about reducing forests and earth becoming warmer, we still celebrate Holi in full gusto. Huge trees are mercilessly chopped years in advance and then dried so that the fire of holi burns well. In our (co-operative !!) society, every year cultural committee organizes Rain dance on the day of Holi, they get the tanker full of water and people dance on the groovy DJ music till they get drenched with the last drop water in that tanker. Imagine how many people would have quenched their thirst with that amount of water!!

Visualise the processions for Ganapati Visarjan. How the bunch of few millions (devotees!!) bring the city like Bombay to standstill. Offices are closed earlier, schools have holidays and for everyone else who is not interested in dancing on streets (shaking their bodies in the most hideous fashion) it’s a compulsory curfew. Imagine the money lost, time wasted and inconvenience caused to everyone else and all this in the name of Lord Ganesha!!

Instead of following these things mindlessly, can we re-evaluate everything that we have been doing today? Can we understand the context of those age-old traditions, use our better sense and make the necessary amends?

Everything that our wise ancestors had created had strong reasoning. All that was true, viable and useful for that age. Older generations passed on those treasures to us and our job is to pass it on to the next generation. If we are not able to show value of those traditions/practices to our youngsters, they would either not follow them in the right spirit or they (traditions) would die their natural death. We need to understand our responsibility in this matter. We have been fortunate to have got better education, ability to rationalize the matters and exposure to various other practices in different cults/regions/religions. We have a scientific mind that can differentiate between reasonable and unreasonable, necessary and unnecessary, what can take our lives forward towards harmony and well being vs. what would pull us down and ruin us eventually.

Can we put our better sense to work? Can we stop doing and start questioning?