Ganesh Chaturthi

Ganesh Chaturthi is the festival celebrating the birth of Ganesha, the elephant-headed god of wisdom and new beginnings and the remover of obstacles. Families and communities bring clay images of Ganesha into their homes and public pavilions, worship him for between one and eleven days, and then carry him in joyful processions to be immersed in water. It is one of the most exuberant festivals in India, especially in Maharashtra.

The festival begins on the fourth day (chaturthi) of the bright half of the Hindu month of Bhadrapada, usually in late August or September. It is also called Vinayaka Chaturthi.

Bringing Ganesha home

In the days before the festival, artisans' workshops fill with images of Ganesha in every size, from small figures for home shrines to towering statues for public pavilions. On the first day families bring their image home to music and chanting, and install it on a decorated platform.

A priest or a family member then performs prana pratishtha, a ritual that invites the deity's presence into the image. For the rest of the festival, Ganesha is treated as an honoured guest: worshipped with puja and aarti every morning and evening, and offered flowers, red hibiscus, blades of durva grass and sweets.

Modak

Ganesha's favourite food is said to be modak, a sweet dumpling usually filled with coconut and jaggery. Offerings of 21 modaks are common. Other sweets such as laddoo are also offered and shared as prasad.

Visarjan: the farewell

Depending on family custom, the image is kept for one and a half, three, five, seven or ten days. On the final day it is carried in procession to a river, lake or the sea and immersed in a ceremony called visarjan. Crowds dance to drums and chant Ganpati Bappa Morya, pudhchya varshi lavkar ya, Marathi for “Lord Ganesha, come back soon next year”. The largest immersions take place on Anant Chaturdashi, the fourteenth day of the lunar fortnight.

The immersion expresses the belief that God takes form to be with devotees and then returns to the formless, and reminds worshippers of the impermanence of all things.

Don't look at the moon

A well-known tradition warns against looking at the moon on the night of Ganesh Chaturthi. According to the story, the moon laughed at Ganesha's round belly and elephant head, and Ganesha cursed it. Anyone who sees the moon that night is said to risk being falsely accused. One Purana tells how even Krishna was wrongly accused of stealing a precious jewel, the Syamantaka, after seeing the moon on this night.

From home festival to public celebration

Ganesh Chaturthi had long been celebrated in homes, and under the Maratha rulers of the 17th and 18th centuries it enjoyed royal patronage. In 1893 the nationalist leader Bal Gangadhar Tilak promoted large public celebrations in Pune, using them to bring people together across caste lines and to build national feeling at a time when British authorities restricted public gatherings.

Today Mumbai's celebrations are among the largest religious events in the world. Its most famous public image, the Lalbaugcha Raja, has been installed each year since 1934 and draws millions of visitors.

Eco-friendly Ganesha

In recent decades, concern has grown about the pollution caused by immersing images made of plaster of Paris and painted with chemical dyes. Many families and temples have returned to traditional unbaked clay images coloured with natural paints, or immerse their image in a bucket or tank at home, and some cities provide artificial ponds for immersion.

Ganesh Chaturthi in the UK

British Hindu communities celebrate Ganesh Chaturthi in homes and mandirs, and some temples organise public processions. Several have used local rivers or the sea for visarjan with the agreement of local authorities, while others hold immersions in tanks on temple grounds.

Sources and further reading

• Paul B. Courtright, Ganesa: Lord of Obstacles, Lord of Beginnings (Oxford University Press, 1985).
• Raminder Kaur, Performative Politics and the Cultures of Hinduism: Public Uses of Religion in Western India (Permanent Black, 2003).