Saturday 26 December 2015

Penniless Celebration of Festivals

On many occasion I have made statement that I am socialist by heart and not by ideology. Before I come to understand any ideology and operating philosophy behind that I acted like a socialist. Religiously I followed my conviction to stand by the weaker one in any walk of life. Whatever the situation I always made people to listen each other and come out a path for reconciliation.

My childhood days had passed in my own small village named Latraha. This village was divided into two clear cut landscape. After giving a glance on my village, one can easily decipher that half of my village produces a picture of prosperity while other half produces dismal condition. Suri (a local name for Bania caste) was the dominant caste of my village as they were Zamindars during British era and have build palace type home in the village, which formed that properous cluster of my village. Carpenters were numerically dominant caste and almost all of them were daily wage earners. As my mother tells, even my uncle who was a daily wage earner have to go without food sometime. My father being a government employee helped him to come out from this situation. Along with carpenters, other so called lower castes formed other part of the village. The other part has small homes made of mud walls and roofs covered with Khapda. I also spent my earlier five to six years in such rooms with my uncle. Later a big home was build by my father among these small homes. Peculiarly even poor members of Suri-teli caste were part of this poor cluster and have friends among these so called lower castes. My father got friends from other part. Though he was only tenth passed, yet he was considered the wisest in the village. Being a brilliant students I got good friends from other side and already have cousins in in my own side. I still have good memories of those days which I spent with them. Lalbabu, Atmaram, Balram and Pappu were close cousin friend. Dilip, Pappu-2, Vasant, Susheel are some other friends. We played all kind of games including goli and gulli danda together. After fight we also used all kind of abuses of low standard. But still were friend. We together celebrates festivals like Diwali, Holi, Chhat and Durgapuja.
Those days were really peculiar. We used to celebrate festivals without spending any penny but with full enjoyment. On every Dipawali, my all brother and sister were given Rs. 5. My sister used to save those money following my father's teaching of not use crackers for saving environment. My brother used to get more money by insisting and if needed creating scene at home and used to buy big crackers. He always sensed what were the best in the market. I always took different path. I found non of friends having any Penni. So I used to by small crackers and used to distribute among them and enjoyed together. Adding to this we used to make gola of clothes and used to keep this in kerosene oil, again only I have to take this from my home which we used to burn and rotate like a chakra. This way we all actively participated and enjoyed.
Durgapuja were also a big event for us as we always enjoyed going Jalley to participate in Mela. Again non of my friends get any penny. My sister used to buy useful and durable things while my brother spends money for watching movie and other big stuff while I used to buy moodhi, bhuja etc voluminous things to share with my friends and do small but beautiful things.
Another big things was watching movies on every Saturday, and Mahabharata Serial. My brother always got different venue to watch movies. He even goes alone as he was not denied by any villagers because of father status. All friends used to come to me and I always all of them watch together. This used to happen because of my father status and my own charm as I used to get love by elders and in most of cases children of that home used to like me. On many occasions I put condition if you will not allow my friends, I also will not come to your home and fortunately they always welcomed me with my friends.
Anyway all of my brother and sister are complementary to each other. My brother had got wonderful mind who always new things for us.
So I believe in marriage of capitalism and socialism.