Sat Ma­haraj

Hin­du life and fam­i­ly ac­tiv­i­ties are cen­tred around a 12-month re­li­gious cal­en­dar gen­er­al­ly pub­lished by the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha es­pe­cial­ly for Hin­du cit­i­zens of T&T. The pan­chang or re­li­gious cal­en­dar fol­lows a cyclic pat­tern which is re­peat­ed on an an­nu­al ba­sis.

Each event is pre­ced­ed by and fol­lowed by ac­tiv­i­ties that re­late to each oth­er. This cy­cle of events sel­dom ever varies and if it does, it will be be­cause the as­trologers have found changes in the plan­ets that in­flu­ence life on Earth.

Dur­ing the re­cent­ly con­clud­ed In­di­an Ar­rival Day (May 30) cel­e­bra­tions many mov­ing sto­ries were pub­lished. The ge­neal­o­gy search for roots in In­dia fas­ci­nates many of our cit­i­zens who orig­i­nate from the In­di­an sub-con­ti­nent. On In­di­an Ar­rival Day, the Ma­ha Sab­ha held a mas­sive cel­e­bra­tion with thou­sands of chil­dren, teach­ers and par­ents in Debe, south Trinidad. There were a num­ber of dis­trac­tions like our fe­male pro­test­ers who used the wrong venue to tell their sto­ry.

But I sus­pect that the pur­pose was not to tell the sto­ry but to grab the head­lines away from our chil­dren and their an­ces­tors. Some of these an­ces­tors worked the swamp lands that are now com­ing face to face with 21st cen­tu­ry re­al­i­ties. But the most mov­ing im­ages to come out of that Debe cel­e­bra­tion, which was al­so ad­dressed by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, was a 15-minute video of her meet­ing with rel­a­tives in the state of Bi­har, In­dia, from whence her grand­fa­ther came to Trinidad as a ja­ha­ji.

This video of Prime Min­is­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar em­brac­ing her long-sep­a­rat­ed rel­a­tives in Bi­har, with both Prime Min­is­ter and dis­tant cousins unashamed­ly wip­ing each oth­er's tears, was very mov­ing. This whole episode was wit­nessed by over 100,000 peo­ple and through the medi­um of tele­vi­sion and ra­dio by hun­dreds of mil­lions across In­dia.

The video al­so showed our Prime Min­is­ter be­ing em­braced by the Pres­i­dent of In­dia and Kam­la ac­tu­al­ly touch­ing the feet of the el­der stateswoman. A les­son in re­spect and hu­mil­i­ty that every politi­cian in Trinidad and in­deed every cit­i­zen should em­u­late.

But to me the most mov­ing sto­ry of the cel­e­bra­tions was pub­lished by News­day on May 31. The head­line read: "Soog­a­ree's se­cret to a life of 100 years-no meat and poo­ja." Writ­ten by Lau­rel V Wil-liams, part of the sto­ry reads: "Soog­a­ree Jat­tan has at­trib­uted her long life of 108 years, which she cel­e­brat­ed yes­ter­day, to a strict veg­e­tar­i­an di­et and prayers.

"Born in In­dia in 1904, Jat­tan turned 108 on In­di­an Ar­rival Day and cel­e­brat­ed with her great grand­chil­dren and great-great grand­chil­dren at her home at San­ford East Street, Cal­i­for­nia, Cou­va. "It was a spe­cial hol­i­day for the fam­i­ly gath­ered at her house, where they served Jat­tan food and ice cream. When News­day vis­it­ed Jat­tan, she was dressed in a white dress and orah­ni (head scarf).

"Jat­tan is a moth­er of five. How­ev­er fam­i­ly mem­bers could not re­call the num­ber of grand­chil­dren she has, but did say she has great grand­chil­dren, great-great grand­chil­dren and at least one great-great-great grand­child. "Jat­tan does not have any ill­ness and there is no need for her to take med­ica­tion. But, old age has chal­lenged her hear­ing. She eats and drinks any kind of food, ex­cept meat. Asked the se­cret to her longevi­ty, Sylvester stooped next to Jat­tan and shout­ed in her ear. Jat­tan replied, 'I do poo­ja.'"

Poo­ja is in­di­vid­ual or fam­i­ly wor­ship gen­er­al­ly per­formed on an earth­en al­tar. This al­tar is usu­al­ly dec­o­rat­ed with re­li­gious plants with a young ba­nana tree in the mid­dle. Var­i­ous in­gre­di­ents har­vest­ed from na­ture are of­fered while the sa­cred mantras (word for­mu­la) are re­cit­ed by the fam­i­ly's pun­dit.

At the close of the en­tire pro­ceed­ings and again with the in­vo­ca­tions of the pun­dit, a jhan­di (prayer flag) is plant­ed in recog­ni­tion of the par­tic­u­lar de­ity to whom the poo­ja was per­formed. In T&T, In­di­an Ar­rival Day is now a pub­lic hol­i­day and state fi­nan­cial as­sis­tance is of­fered to some of the groups that have a record in these cel­e­bra­tions. But for thou­sands of years Hin­dus have been cel­e­brat­ing on an an­nu­al ba­sis the mem­o­ry of their an­ces­tors.

On Sep­tem­ber 30 we be­gin a pe­ri­od of two weeks called Pitra Paksh where the devo­tee faces the ris­ing sun and of­fers tarpan (wa­ter from a lota), chant­i­ng the name of the an­ces­tors. Bra­jak­ishore Swain, in his book ti­tled The Dhara­masas­tra, has writ­ten an en­tire chap­ter on an­ces­tor wor­ship. He writes:

"Srad­dha is a form of 'an­ces­tor wor­ship,' which re­flects the grat­i­tude of the liv­ing de­scen­dants to dead for­bears, or the awe and fear in­spired by be­lief in such an­ces­tor's oc­cu­py­ing a po­si­tion, af­ter their death, in which they can con­fer ben­e­fits or cause harm. Bless­ings and curs­es from the spir­its of de­part­ed an­ces­tors are uni­ver­sal­ly held to be po­tent.

"The idea that do­ing a srad­dha to a par­tic­u­lar dead per­son is a du­ty im­posed by dhar­ma... Du­ty has to be dis­charged. "In mo­ments of ap­proach­ing fes­tiv­i­ties or joy­ful oc­ca­sions, like mar­riages, or af­ter in­ci­dents like the birth of a son, it is right to re­call one's oblig­a­tions to an­ces­tors and con­ceive them as shar­ing one's joys as well as sor­rows."

• Sat­narayan Ma­haraj is the sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha