Andhra Pradesh - Tirupati   

Traditional start to `Ganga Jatara' at midnight

Staff Reporter

Use of filthy language is the peculiar feature of fete

SETTING THE STAGE: Priests tying `Vadibalu' to the `Viswaroopa Sthambham' at Gangamma temple in Tirupati on Tuesday, signalling the beginning of Ganga Jatara. — Photo: K.V. Poornachandra Kumar

TIRUPATI: `Ganga Jatara,' the folk festival of Tirupati, began with the formal `Chatimpu' (announcement) around midnight of Tuesday.

It is one of the major folk festivals of the region, similar to the `Sammakka Sarakka Jatara' of Telangana, where devotees from neighbouring States also throng in large numbers with the belief that she is the sister of Venkateswara. It has been a practice for non-Hindus also to worship the deity during the festival.

The temple at Thathayagunta, which will be visited daily by thousands of devotees during the week-long festival, has been specially spruced up under the supervision of the chairman S. Sudhakar Reddy and executive officer M. Sankara Naidu.

Initiatory rituals

Priests performed the initiatory rituals and tied `Vadibalu' to the `Viswaroopa Sthambam' in front of the temple, that set the stage for the fete. Men making the `Chatimpu' roamed through the old town beating `dappus' to announce that the festival had begun and hence the residents should not leave the town till the festival is over.

`Gift' to goddess

As Gangamma is believed to have hailed from Avilala, a village south of Tirupati, a `saarey' (traditional gift) consisting of silk clothes, turmeric, bangles and kumkum, was brought from the village to the temple by the `Kaikala' community.

The special feature of the festival is the donning of a new guise (Vesham) everyday by the devotees like `Bairagi', `Banda', `Thoti', `Dora', `Mathangi,' etc. Most native inhabitants of the town take part religiously by smearing coal powder, kumkum, limestone paste etc. on their body on each day.

The other peculiar feature is the use of filthy language. Devotees scold one another and also the passersby with obscene words which are mostly unprintable, but taken as a `blessing'.

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