Rituals in India- Local deities

Rituals in India- Local deities

Almost every community of this colorful and cultural land of Rajasthan has their own deity and every village has a temple of different deity. The importance of the deity is so specific that the community does nothing without taking permission from these deities. They have their own language, rituals, folk dances, songs and stories of courage and warriors.

 These deities are ancestors of a village with symbolic terms and symbols of courage and stories printed on temples. One of the important features of these deities is their flags by which they are recognized.

There are some flags which are huge and have different symbols on it. During the procession of religious ceremonies, the main panch carry the flag so that people can recognize the group that they are coming from a certain village.

 It is not fair to say that the whole of India believe and practice same religion. There are hundreds of communities and sub communities and every community is having their own deity like Tejaji, Pupaji, Ramdevji and so on.

The social fabric is so defined that no member can disobey the rules of community panchayat. Even today people move to community panchayats rather than approaching judicial courts of the land. There are different levels of panchayats to decide different social and religious matters.

The village panchayat is governed by a panchayat of eleven villages and that panchayat is governed by the bench of twenty one villages and then panchayat of fifty one villages. Above all these panchayat there is maha panchayat who decide final matters.  It is about marriage, divorce, land dispute, crime or even financial irregularities, these panchayats solve the problem. But now days people are coming to judicial courts as things are changing.

For example, a Gujjar agitation was staged in the state demanding reservation. This community found that they are socially and educationally backward and therefore need reservation in government jobs. Gujjars are either farmers or cattle farmers but education percentage is still less in this community.

And when the maha panchayat decided that they need reservation, this community jammed the transportation of the state and jammed the railway lines. Thousands of gujjaras came and sat on railway lines and on highways which shaken the law and order situation. The decision of maha panchayat is so acceptable that no group deny such decisions.

Rajasthan remained land of kings and knights and royal castes who had their own culture, customs and rituals and also literature. They ruled this land and have their own states.

 These local communities formed their own societies and remained like under current and unable to get reorganization even on state level because their literature, stories and customs fail to surface because there was no education. The literature was written for the upper castes and royal families.

These deities are the source of energy in villages and communities. People visit to these temples demanding blessing from their ancestors because these deities are their ancestors. Deities hear the problems and give power to the member to fight for the right as codified in unwritten law of their groups.