You’d Be Stunned To Know How Holi Is Celebrated in This Rajasthan Village

Friday, April 01 2016, 03:03:15

Priya Motiani

Blogger

You’d Be Stunned To Know How Holi Is Celebrated in This Rajasthan Village

JWB Post

March 23, 2016

The Kalyanipura village near Ajmer has an intriguing age-old Holi tradition. Whether it is in favor or disfavor of women, you decide!

The women of this village have an exclusive privilege of playing Holi all alone. Psst! The newly-married women and the ones with new-born babies are especially at the radar of being smeared in color first and foremost.

What are the men up to in this case, you may ask? Well, they stay at the periphery to guard all the entrances to the village so as to ensure that no outsider infringes upon the privacy of the women.

“Although men also play Holi, their presence in the village is only till the noon. The men including youths and boys leave the village on the Holi day and let the women brigade play all alone,” said Sunder Singh Rawat, one of the men of the village.

Think that’s awesome? Well, here’s the best part.

This tradition isn’t caste-based. It serves to protect not just the women of some particular caste, but the whole woman populace of the village at large. When these women are done with the festivity of daubing each other in multiple hues, they clap in unison so as to hint the men to come back to the village.

“In my father’s house we were not allowed to leave home on the day of Holi. Me and my sister used to see others playing while we had to remain in closed doors. But things have been changed at my husband’s home at Masuda village,” said Shanti, who recently came into the village through marriage.

Do you know of any such or any other Holi tradition? Tell us about it.