Mixed Thoughts

Tomorrow is Diwali and is my 62nd since my birth. There has been lot of changes over these years in celebrating Diwali.
The very first or known Diwali to me was around the age of 8 or so. A team of musicians will visit every house in the street and sing MANGALA ISAI – Holy music around 4.30 AM. We all will be given an oil bath – GANGA SNANAM by our parents.
Sometimes, we were given new dresses and we wore them with great pride and happiness.
My mother would have made sweets and salty dishes of few kinds and we will eat the same along with hot idly with sambar and chutney.
The sweets were always shared with neighbors and they exchanged greetings along with sweets. My parents gave us money to buy crackers, sparklers, chakras, flower pots, ribbons, snakes and red color caps and a variety of light emitting matches.
In all we would have spent a good FIVE RUPEES then. This amount was very big and made DENT in the monthly family budget.
Rich family children spent more money and letting off in smoke by way of indulging in setting fire to crackers etc;
I used to go with fellow children from our street and roamed around till what we ate has been digested.
As the years passed, I gradually distanced myself from celebrating the festival as I felt many of my friends were less fortunate in observing any festival.
Then came my college and career days when I continued to observe Diwali with friends of the like nature. We gave away sweets and crackers to needy children and enjoyed their being happy and sumptuous in their celebration of the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS.
There were few DIWALI occasions such as the first one after my FIRST JOB, marriage and one after joining job in gulf.
On all these occasions, I remembered my past and that of most of my friends who were sailing in the same boat as me.
Now it’s my children’s and my grandsons’ Diwali. Last week we were in Bangalore where my children and Ayush briefly celebrated DIWALI, as were to be in our own house on Diwali day.
I see in my grandchild- Ayush- my days when I hid myself from the noise of ever bursting crackers, and ever blinding lights from various flashing sparklers, pencils etc;
Ayush held my daughters’ sari and hid his face and was afraid of the noise from the lighting sparklers alone. Then, I decided to save the embarrassment and took him off to a far off location.
Diwali is NOT a simple festival anymore!
A simple humble festival has become a very occasion involving entertainment, heavy spending, and whiling away precious time in the name of festival activities.
I read in the news papers that the GOVERNMENT target for liquor sale in Tamil Nadu (TASMAC) alone is set for 250 Crore rupees. True and spirited festival! Almost everyone will be in full spirits.
I saw lots of advertisements in NEWSPAPERS promoting sale of everything that is needed for Diwali. I’m surprised that people have enough funds if not, facility to take loan for buying anything. You name it, it is there!
Gold, diamond, variety of ornaments, dress, dress material, utensils, Pressure cookers, DVDs, A/C units, life size wall mountable TVs etc; the list goes on extending.
The festival is time for spending more money; loan is available to be paid back in 60 monthly installments and beyond. No wonder some of the offers are publicized as ONCE IN A LIFE TIME OFFER!
All regional TV channels are showing variety of programs sponsored by business houses such as home appliance makers, gold and jewelry companies, Mobile phone makers, silk sari show rooms, and so on;
There is EQUAL opportunity for these companies to publicize their products as there is for festival spirited buyers. Millions of rupees are involved in publicity alone especially with FULL PAGE COLOR ADVERTISEMENTS IN ALMOST ALL NEWSPAPERS. Who pays for it, the buyers, as every cost of production and publicity is added to the product.

What is missing is true spirit of happiness and reciprocation of the same.
Most activities are for showing ones wealth and competing with relatives and friends in showing off, false prestige and fictitious happiness, and what is lost is a good amount of money that could be spared for a better cause.
Well, that’s what I feel as my observations lead to similar thoughts. May be one day the fervor will be back as festival of lights which represents the death of evil and resumption of goodness everywhere.
With all these wavering thoughts generated by feeling of exposure to the entire present environment, I decided to seek solace by sitting quietly in the prayer room requesting the all powerful GOD to give me peace and strength for overcoming the state of affairs around.
May GOD bless us all.

V.Sivasubramaniam