Pongal – The Festival Of Harvest And Thanksgiving

Pongal is a reaping festive event celebrated by the Tamil people all over the world. The meaning of festival name in Tamil is boiling over or spill over. This is depicted through the boiling over of milk in a clay pot and this is regarded as the symbol of hope and best wishes for the family in the upcoming time. This event is equivalent to the Thanksgiving festival wherein people thank the sun, rain, and the farm animals that play an important role in good harvest. This means that Pongal is the celebration of prosperity that is the outcome of a good harvest. The main ritual of this festival is to offer a Pongal of rice and milk (made from the first harvest) to the sun in the anticipation of plentiful good harvest.

Pongal concur with another festive event named Makar Sankranti observed in different parts of India. This event marks the recommencement of the sun’s journey towards the North for 6 months where it enters the Zodiac sign of Capricorn or Makar and provides an indication of long days now onwards. This is also as the Uttarayana.

Makar Sankrant is observed as a traditional holiday on 14th January in most of the states in India and Nepal. It is also celebrated in SriLanka, Mauritius, South Africa, U.S., U.K., and Singapore. Pongal is actually a 4-day festival of worshipping nature from 12th – 15th January according to the Gregorian calendar.

History

The festival of Pongal is considered to be started prior to 1000 years old, but some believe that it is as old as 2000 years. According to some, it was started in between 200 B.C. to 300 A.D. in the Sangam era.

In the ancient period of the Chola Empire, it was celebrated as Puthiyeedu meaning the first harvest of the year. As the festival is believed to originate in the TamilNadu state of India, Pongal is also called Tamizhar Thirunal that means the festival of Tamils. A famous quote of this festival in Tamil is Thai Pirandhal Vazhi Pirakkum, which means the birth of the month of Thai (January/February) will open the door of new opportunities.

Legend

There are two interesting legends associated with Pongal.

Legend of Mount Govardhan

This fable is linked with the first day of the festival and involves the role Lord Indra, who is the God of clouds and rains and Lord Krishna, who is the reincarnation of Lord Vishnu. At the childhood time of Lord Krishna, people worshipped Lord Indra also known as the king of deities to please him for good rains and harvest. This respect made Lord Indra proudy and arrogant, which further made him believed that he is the most powerful being in the entire Universe. Krishna then thought to teach him a lesson. Due to this aim, Krishna convinced his friends and people of his town Gokul (in North India) to worship Mount Govardhan and not Lord Indra. Enraged with this, Lord Indra generated abundant and never-ending thunder, lightning, and heavy rains that flooded Gokul. To protect the people and animals, Shree Krishna raised the huge mountain of Govardhan just with his little finger and remained standing on the support of that finger to protect all the beings from the storm and flood. This tormenting storm lasted for three days. However, at last, Indra realized that he was wrong to be proud and that Lord Krishna is the divine being. In the confession of his mistake, he vowed to be humble and requested for forgiveness from Krishna. Since then, the Bhogi celebrations (first day of Pongal) are done for Indra. From this story, the festival is also known as Indran.

Legend of Lord Shiva and Basava

This legend is associated with the third day of Pongal that involves the tale of Lord Shiva and his bull, Nandi (Basava). As per the legend, Lord Shiva asked his bull to give his message of having an oil massage, daily bath, eating food only once in a month to the people on the Earth. By mistake, Basava asked people to eat food daily and have an oil massage and bath once a month. Due to anger, Shiva cursed Basava to live on the Earth forever and help in ploughing fields. He further cursed that there would be lack of grains on Earth. Therefore, the third day marks the importance of the cattle. This day’s celebration is similar to that of the Raksha Bandhan.

The Auspicious Days of Pongal

• Bhogi Pongal
  This is the first day when people throw their old clothes and other things in fire specifying the end of the old Thai and advent of the new one.

• Surya PongalThis is main day of Pongal marking the first day of Tamil month Thai. It is celebrated by creating a Pongal of boiling over the rice, fresh milk, and jaggery in a new pot of mud and then decorating with brown sugar, cashew nuts, and raisins. This is done in the early morning. When the rice boils over, a ritual is performed in which people shout Ponggalo Ponggal to spread the message of good luck and wishes for the upcoming year. This Pongal is then offered to the nature at sunrise as a symbol of thanks for blessing with prosperity. It is afterwards served to the other family members and guests.

• Mattu PongalThis day is the Thanksgiving Day to cattle in helping the farmers for better harvest. The cattle are adorned with flowers, bells, metallic covers, and gold; and are left free to roam. They are fed with sweet rice and sugarcane. In villages, a competing event named Jallikattu is held that includes taming the wild bull.

• Thiruvalluvar Day/Kaanum (to view) PongalThis is the Thanksgiving Day to all relatives and friends for their support in harvest. People visit each other’s homes and chew sugarcane. In addition, decorating the home’s entrance porch with Rangoli (Kolam) is a traditional activity of this day. This day also marks the birth of the famous Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar.