‘Pongal festival is losing its sheen, but today’s gen needs to preserve it for posterity’

Tamil homes across the globe are celebrating the harvest festival of Pongal on January 14. On this auspicious occasion, historian and researcher Meenakshi Devaraj talks to DT Next about how the harvest festival is losing its significance among Chennaiites and the need to conserve it

The festival of Pongal is one of the most important festivals for Tamils. It is our way of saying thanks to nature. If we look at Tamil literature, we can find a lot of references to the festival. In the Sangam landscape, the agricultural region is known as Marutham and the deity of the region is god Indra. I have not seen Tamil literature works detailing any festival celebrated in such a grand way as Indira vizha is been described. In Portuguese records about Madras, it is mentioned that the harvest festival is celebrated for three days continuously with entertainment like dancing. People used to feast the entire month of thai (the tenth month in the Tamil calendar). The word ‘pongal’ was not used earlier to address the festival, it was called Indravizha. During the Silapathikaram era, when Indravizha was celebrated, people have offered pongal just like how we do currently. As time went by, people started calling the festival itself Pongal.

All the kings who ruled the state grandly celebrated the festival. Thiruvotriyur inscription belonging to Rajendra Chola I calls the festival ‘Puthu Yeedu’, meaning the first crop. During that period, houses in villages bore a festive look. In Madras too, many celebrated Pongal. Britishers were amused at the way people hosted it. In Madras

Presidency, Governor William had announced a three-day holiday and had even ordered a gun salute in Fort St George to honour the festival. Those days, Madras had a lot of greenery and harvesting was done on a huge scale. Over the years, we have lost 95 per cent of the agricultural land in Madras.

Forget about today’s generation, many seniors even forgot how the festival was celebrated. Many might think festivals don’t have value anymore. That’s wrong. Each Indian festival has a lot of significance and we should respect and celebrate it. Not just preserving our culture and heritage, celebrating festivals also help in upholding strong values. Most of the festivals are linked to nature – in today’s scenario, it is extremely important to preserve our nature.