Children, in coulourful dress, women in red-bordered sari and men in pyjama-punjabi greeted each other with Shubho Naboborsho in celebrations of Pahela Baishakh, the first day of Bangla New Year, said the High Commission on Monday.
This has been an ancient tradition of the Bangalees since Mughal Emperor Akbar introduced it in 1556 to facilitate tax collection in the harvesting season.
It was a day of music, dance, Mangal Shobhajatra and enjoying the traditional Bangla food as the Delhi mission joined the compatriots at home and all over the world to welcome the day with Rabindranath Tagore’s “Esho heh BaishaikhEsho.” (Come, on Baishakh, Come.)
With the beat of drums and dugdugi (a traditional musical instrument) children, accompanied by women, went round the mission’s Maitree Hall in staging the Mangal Shobhajatra waving replicas of birds, animals, boats, palank and masks highlighting the spirit of secularism and cultural tradition of Bangalees.
They were greeted with thunderous applause from the audience comprising the Bengali community of New Delhi and the members of the mission.
The Mangal Shobhajatra (the procession of good wishes) is a tribute to the secular feature of the festival that has evolved over the years and become an integral part of Bangladesh’s struggle for political and cultural freedom from the tyranny of Pakistan, of which Bangladesh was a part until its independence achieved through a War of Liberation in 1971.
The event also signifies the eternal fight of the good against the evil.
It has been a part of the tradition since late 80s, organised by the teachers and students of Bangladesh Fine Art Institute. The Unesco recognised the pageant as the intangible cultural heritage of the humanity.
Syed Muazzem Ali, Bangladesh High Commissioner to India, wrote in his Pahela Baishakh article in the Indian Express how Chhayanaut, a premier cultural organisation, used the celebrations of PahelaBaishakh as a tool to fight the religious oppression of Pakistan regime.
It was Chhayanaut which first held a public music event at Ramna Batamul in 1967 in celebrations of Pahela Baishakh.
“That marked the beginning of the Bengali nobobarsha in the capital city of Dhaka,” wrote the high commissioner.
“The Pakistani authorities did not look at this development favourably and various attempts were made to kill this initiative. The more they tried to suppress the indomitable Bengali spirit, the more fiercely we resisted and the crowd kept getting bigger every year.”
No to Hilsa
The New Delhi mission decided against offering Hilsa fish, a Bengali delicacy, to guests in response to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s call urging people not to eat the fish at this time.
Only mother hilsa, ready to lay eggs, are available at this time of the season. So, catching mother Hilsa is seen as a culinary offence in Bangladesh. Instead of Hilsa, Ruhi fish was served with Bhuna Khichuri, murighanta, bhaji and bhorta in true Bengali tradition.
The programme was rounded off with a musical soiree by a cultural troupe, led by artist Samina Dey Urmi.