06 Nov Rangoli : A historic ritual of Hindu festival Diwali
Context : On the occasion, we see that Rangoli is depicted in every house on the occasion of Hindu’s auspicious festival diwali . A kolam artist has adopted the multicoloured tradition of the rangoli. In fact the ronoli art is not popular in Northern India but also it is popular in entire India
History
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The word “rangoli” is similar to the word “rangavalli” which is a sanskrit word. Which means “rows of colors,” . Thus the simple meaning of Ranoli is the coloured rows for the purpose of worshiping God and it is depicted on the occasion of diwali to remove darkness from our life
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Rangoli is one of the oldest art in India . The description of Ranoli can be found in Puranas also . Puranas are composed during the Gupta period .
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Rangoli art is made for the worship of god.
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There is a story regarding Rangloi art that is famous in Indian Myth . As per this story this art was originated by Lopamudra , wife of a Rigvedic sage Agasta. Lopmudra also wrote some hymns of the Rigveda . Since Agasta lived in a remote area , it was difficult for him to perform yajnas by making Yagyan Vedi. To help her husband Lopmudra made rangoli art to worship God (It was a decoration of the Yajna Kunda/ vedi)
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Lopamudra used five colours from the universe . She took these five colours from Panchtatva through which this universe is formed . These panch tatvas are sky, wind, water, earth, fire. She took blue colour from sky , green colour from water or nature , black from soil/land/ white colour from wind and red colour from fire . These colours are original colours used in rangoli art
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All these colours of the Rangoli have some significance also . For example black is the symbol of strength and unity, while red colour is the symbol of anger, danger or punishment or law and order. It implies to follow the social rules (Code of conduct), White is the symbol of peace and humbleness and positivity . Nowadays all these colours of Rangoli are used for the decoration on the occasion of Diwali
There are several myths that are popular related to Rangoli. In Gujarat, a story of rangli is related to lord krishna . The wife of Krishna first time made Rangoli in for the worship of Lord Krishna .
Anyway this Rangoli art is famous throughout India and it is known by various names in the various parts of India also.
In west Bengal , rangoli is known as the name of Alpana , while in orissa , its other name is Joti , In Chhattisgarh, it is known as Chauk purna . Generally in some village of Uttar Pradesh Chowk Puran is also another name of rangoli, but , in Chauka purana , in UP, people use only white colour .In Karnataka , Rangoli is the popular with its original name rangoli while in Maharashtra its name is sanskar Bharti. In modern days rangoli art is famous only because of the rangoli artist of the Tamilnadu where Rangoli is called Kaolam
In modern days ,many artists of the Ranoli belonging from Tamilnadu have earned fame at international level. Nowadays , not only on the occasion of Diwali, but also on the occasion of every auspicious festival the Rangoli art is formed .
Plutus IAS Current Affairs Team Member
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