Tradition · assembly of village gods · India
Kullu Dussehra
The Dussehra that begins when everyone else's has ended. From 1660 the village deities of the Kullu valley — two hundred or more, carried in palanquins from their own temples, some walking for days — converge on the Dhalpur maidan to attend on Raghunāth, the Rāma image the raja brought from Ayodhya to expiate a wrong. It is a political event as much as a religious one: precedence, seating and who may enter the tent are all settled by custom and argued about annually.
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Confidence
- Not assessed
- Location
- 31.958, 77.109
Worth knowing
The image was, by the tradition the festival rests on, stolen from Ayodhya on the raja's orders to cure him of an affliction, and the whole assembly is the valley's continuing act of atonement for it.
Connections (1)
- Image migrationAyodhyā
Kullu's Dussehra exists to make amends for a theft. The raja Jagat Singh, afflicted and advised that only the worship of Rāma would cure him, had an image brought from Ayodhya in the 1650s — taken, by the tradition the festival rests on, rather than given — installed it as Raghunāth, and made himself its regent rather than its king. The two hundred village deities who come down the valley each October come to attend on that image, so the assembly is a continuing act of atonement.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Kullu Dussehra”. Himachal Pradesh language and culture department records; Mahesh Sharma, The Realm of Faith on Himachal deity cults.
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