Mahalakshmi Festival
The Mahalakshmi Vrat ends today and like many other Indian communities who worship the Goddess of Wealth; Mahalakshmi Mata, Sindhis too, will celebrate the day by untying the Sagda (Auspicious thread), offering fried sweets and seeking blessings from the Mahalakshmi Mata.
Mahalakshmi, the supreme ‘Mother- Goddess’ also referred to as ‘श्री’ (श्री in Sanskrit means ‘Noble’) is often considered same as the Goddess Lakshmi but it is believed that since it is impossible to imagine, to fathom and to describe the Supreme Goddess, hence the mere mortals generally follow Goddess Lakshmi, the manifestation of Mahalakshmi.
The word Lakshmi in Sanskrit means ‘the one who leads you to your laksh i.e goal’ and hence the believers worship Lakshmi and Mahalakshmi Mata to receive the bliss of prosperity, wealth, fortune and many materialistic as well as spiritual gains.
Like many other communities, Sindhis begin the Mahalakshmi Vrat by tying a sacred thread called ‘ Sagdo’ (Plural = Sagda). The Brahminis (Lady priests) make Sagda by bringing together 16 strands of cotton yarn (16 tand-u) and thereby making a thick thread which is then carefully rolled (so that the strands do not entangle) and soaked in turmeric mixed water. The Sagdo for a couple is called B^itto sagdo and it is actually two individual Sagda connected with a single thread i.e two sagda made in continuity leaving a small portion of single thread in between. B^itto sagdo is pulled apart at this single thread point and then the spouses tie each on his/her wrist.
Once you receive the threads (one each for a family member) you are supposed to tie 16 knots in each Sagdo.
The Sagdo is wrapped around the wrist (Like a Mauli thread) and one and a half knot is tied to secure the thread. This is to assure easy untying of the Sagdo when the fast ends as one cannot cut it with a scissor or break it with force.
The sagdo is tied on the Radha Ashtami day (4th day of Ganesh Utsav) and is untied after 16 days i.e on the 8th Shradh day.
One can opt to keep it tied for all the 16 days or just tie and untie it on the 16th day.
One is supposed to eat satvik food and refrain from meat/eggs as long as one is wearing the thread.
On the 16th day of Mahalakshmi Vrat, Sindhis make Gach (Recipe and Recipe video shared here), Satpuda (layered, crunchy maida puris), Maida puri and Sorhi/roat and Titar.
Sorhi or the Roat as many call it, is made the same way as the Gach but the shape is different. The dough ball is rolled into a disc and 16 pointed edges are pinched out to make a Sorhi (related to the term ‘sixteen’) while Titar are the ones having 4 edges.
Interestingly in Varanasi /Kashi a fair is held every year to celebrate Mahalakshmi and every ritual followed there has an aspect of ‘sixteen’ for example, the fast is observed for 16 days, the sankalp thread has 16 knots, people take 16 parikramas of the Devi and offer 16 grains of rice, 16 strays of Druva grass and 16 pallav (baby leaves /shoots).
Another interesting thing that I came to know is that even in Odisha people observe somewhat similar traditions while worshipping Goddess Laxmi. The unique Odia festival is called Sudasa Brata and they follow the rule of 10’s instead of 16 (10 knots in the thread, 10 flowers are offered, a bhog of 10 types of Chenna sweets is made, so on and so forth).
Coming back to Sindhi style Mahalakshmi Puja rituals, on the 16th day of Mahalakshmi fast, after frying all the sweets, generally, the leftover oil/ghee in the frying pan is used to make halwa/sheera or even the seyun (sweet vermicelli). Some fry only the roat while others make Roat, Titar, satpuda and soft puris too. Some do not make any sweets and instead use packs of Glucose biscuits.
The Sagda are untied and each one is wrapped on a stack of 4 maida puris (or on a pack of glucose biscuit).
Portions of fried ‘prasad’ are kept in a thaal (or plate) and dough lamps (aate ke diye) are made. The number of dough lamps made varies from family to family. The prasad, sagda and the dough lamps are then carried to the Brahmini.
A katha (folk tale/story) related to Mahalakshmi is then told by the Brahmini and the ladies (generally but not exclusively) offer the goodies brought from their homes to the Brahmini.
To watch the Puja rituals and to listen to the Mahalakshmi Katha, please watch this video captured by my hubby when he and his friends (from Sindhyatfoundation) organised the Puja two years ago in the pre pandemic era.
An interesting part of the Puja ritual is the small horse made from clay or mud or even from the dough. In olden days the priests would hand over the clay horses to the ladies visiting her for Puja and it was supposed to be kept safe in the kitchen or inside the cupboard.
Personally I never saw that ritual to be followed in the temple where my mom used to visit for the puja. But thanks to some of the members of the SindhiRasoi Facebook group I came to know about this ritual.
This ritual too varies from place to place. While in the past a clay horse was given to each devotee, nowadays only single horse is kept for the Puja and while some offer grass and rice grains to the clay horse, others shower bits and pieces of the cotton on the horse and it is later used to make wicks to light the oil lamps in the temples.
I tried to find out the significance of the horse in Mahalakshmi Puja ritual but there are way too many legends and folk tales associated with it and it is hard to pinpoint the exact reason.
Here is one such version:
When Revanta, son of the Sun God, visited Lord Vishnu, His wife, Mata lakshmi, kept gazing at Revanta and that irked Lord Vishnu and he turned Mata laksmi into a Mare. When she requested Him to have mercy, the Lord said that her curse will end when she will give birth to a foal. Devastated, she prayed to Lord Shiva who urged Lord Vishnu to turn into a horse. And hence once again Lord Vishnu and Maha Lakshmi united in the form of the Horse and the Mare.
Some priests say that the horse given on Mahalakshmi is Lord Vishnu in horse’s avatar while some other believe that the king Manglik who abandoned his wife for disrespecting Mahalakshmi Sagda, when reunited with her after she did penance for her rude behaviour, they travelled on ‘this’ horse back to their kingdom.
Some also believe it to be a symbolic horse sacrifice (Ashwamedha Yajna). Also, in olden days horses were sacrificed when wishes were fulfilled. Later on, the sacrifice of innocent living beings was condemned so instead the mud/clay figurines were given away (donated) at the completion of a fast or when a wish was fulfilled.
I am yet to figure out the significance of the clay horse here. If you know it, kindly share it in the comment section.
Many thanks to Meena Chijwani and Juhi Lalwani and my bestie, R.K for sharing the lovely pictures of the rituals!
