BHIM DUTTA, NEPAL – For 360 days of the year, Radhika Bhatta, 43, says she doesn’t have any time for herself. A housewife in Bhim dutta, a municipality in Nepal’s Far-Western region, Bhatta spends nearly every day doing household chores like most women in this rural area.
She says she works hard from dawn until dusk. Women here are responsible for cooking, cleaning, collecting firewood, performing farm chores, rearing livestock, and caring for their children, husbands and elders.
But during the five days of Gaura Parva, a festival for married women that has its roots in Nepal’s Far-Western region, there is a moment of relief. Bhatta and other wives get a break from their daily chores to celebrate the festival meant just for them.
“It’s just these five days that we’re free,” a jovial Bhatta says.
Bhatta says the married women look forward to the festival all year.
“We have to celebrate the Gaura Parva,” she says. “We have to have fun.”
Gaura Parva consists of five days of fasting and celebrating in the name of a Hindu goddess. Women and cultural experts say it’s the one festival that is just for married women and their only time of year to relax. Originally an indigenous festival, Gaura Parva has expanded to link women across castes, across the country and across the border with India.
People in Nepal’s Far-Western region and areas in India that share a border with Nepal, like Kumaon and Gadwal, mainly celebrate this festival. There is little evidence about the beginning of this festival, but Hindu texts mention the festival’s existence since the mythological era.
“This is a religious tradition that has existed since ages,” says Jyotish Acharya Ghanashyam Lekhak, associate professor at Sharada Campus, which is affiliated with Mahendra Sanskrit University.
According to legends, Hindu gods fought against demons to get the nectar from the ocean that made them immortal. As the demons proved stronger and the gods were losing their grip, Lord Vishnu, one of the gods, transformed himself into the female figure of Mohini and tricked the demons into surrendering the nectar. Mohini then gave the nectar to the gods to make them immortal, which many say Gaura Parva commemorates.
Motilal Paneru, professor and former campus chief of the same college as Lekhak, says that married women celebrate Gaura Parva for another reason. He says that because the Hindu god Shiva was devastated after the death of his first wife, Sati Devi, she was reborn as Gauri. As Gauri began to pray that Shiva would become her husband, she started fasting. She accomplished her mission on the fifth day, and that’s why the day is celebrated in the form of Gaura, when married women fast for five days.
Every year, women mainly in Nepal’s Far-Western region observe this festival for five days in either August or September, depending on the lunar calendar.
During the first day of the event, women soak wheat, black lentils, peas, brown lentils and rhododendron flowers. The following day, the women clean the soaked ingredients, called “biruda,” in a nearby water spout. They then use paddy plants to erect a figure of Gaura Devi, the goddess worshipped during this festival, and wrap a red cloth around it.
On the third day, the women bring Gaura Devi’s figure into their households in a celebratory atmosphere. On the fourth day, the women offer the biruda to the goddess. This is the most important day of the festival.
The community also joins in to perform the traditional song and dance known as the “deuda.” Deuda is a group dance performed by the community throughout the festival in which people form a close circle with their shoulders touching.
After only eating once a day – during the evenings – for the first three days, married women don’t eat at all on the fourth day. On the fifth day, they break their fast and share the offerings, known as “prasadi,” with their family members.
And as the five days of singing and dancing ends, they lay to rest the erected image of the goddess in a nearby field, and they bring home the red cloth that had been wrapped around her. Then, the entire community performs the deuda.
Lekhak says Gaura differs from Teej, another festival for women in the Hindu calendar in which married women fast for the long lives of their husbands and unmarried women fast for good husbands. Gaura Parva is only for married women, and they believe that the goddess grants their wishes during the festival.
“This is taken as a victory upon evil,” Lekhak says.
While cultural and religious values envelop the festival, women like Parvati Joshi, also a resident of Bhim Dutta, prefer to call it a “festival for woman.”
“This is our [women’s] festival,” she says as she worships the goddess Gaura. “Festivals like Dashain and Tihar is celebrated by all. Men have control over them. But in this festival, women control everything.”
Dhana Joshi, another woman who participated in the festival but isn’t related to Parvati Joshi, agrees.
“The men only give us company,” she says. “Rest is all done by women.”
Tekraj Panta, a professor and cultural expert, says that it’s only during these five festive days that women of the Far-Western region get time off from their daily responsibilities.
“During these days, women are free and have a chance to forget their household chores and other troubles,” Panta says.
Panta says it’s called a women’s festival because of the free spirit associated with the women during this festival and the importance they have in it.
“A woman [goddess] is worshipped, and it’s the women who conduct the worshipping,” he says. “Men are mere spectators.”
For many women who work endlessly in many parts of Nepal, this festival is a chance to bond with fellow women. It’s an opportunity to free their spirits and enjoy some leisure time outside their household responsibilities.
“This festival is a representation of woman power,” Lekhak says. “It’s celebrated to pay respect to women.”
But the festival has expanded over the years to include more groups. Until fairly recently, it used to be only women of the Brahmin and Chhetri castes, the two upper castes according to Nepal’s caste system, who celebrated the Gaura Parva. But the festival has disassociated itself from these social protocols.
“It’s because of the social prejudice toward the Dalits [lower castes] that the differences existed,” Paneru says. “Nothing as such is mentioned in the religious texts.”
As the society has been progressively sidelining the caste issue, the Dalits have also started celebrating Gaura Parva during the past five years, Lekhak says. And this has further fostered communal bonding among people.
The festival today also isn’t limited to only Far-Western Nepal. It’s helped to create recognition for the region as some Nepalis even in Kathmandu, the capital, now celebrate the festival as well.
This festival has been an integral part of the Far-Western region and is celebrated in all nine districts there. But it gained national spotlight four years ago when the government declared it as a national holiday.
After the monarchy was overthrown and Nepal became a republic in 2006, the country, which had been a Hindu kingdom and only celebrated Hindu festivals publicly, became a secular state. Nepal’s countless languages, dialects, religions and cultures are now equally recognized, including Gaura Parva, an indigenous holiday that is now marked as a public holiday.
Basudev Bhaisab, another cultural expert, says the festival also creates significant cultural ties between Nepal and India because of its celebration in various border towns.
Married women say they can bond and have fun during the festival – a rare time of relaxation that they look forward to all year.
