Home ›› 14 Apr 2023 ›› Opinion
Pahela Baishakh is the biggest secular festival for Bengalis across the world who celebrate the day with much fervour and enthusiasm. The festival marks the end of the harvest season where people celebrate the reaps of the season gone by. Especially in the rural areas Pahela Baisakh is a significant day for commerce that’s when the new accounts book - the Haal Khaata - is opened by the traders to mark the beginning of the new accounting year.
Every year people of Bangladesh commemorate Pahela Baishakh with much enthusiasm and verve. Different cultural organisations chalk out varieties of programmes to mark this significant day. The nation celebrates the first day of Bangla calendar amid traditional fanfare and festivity leaving behind the gloomy days of the past. People from all walks of life rush to Ramna Botomul on 14th April to welcome the Bengali New Year. Cross sections of people have already started preparing themselves for Baishakh. Meanwhile a lot of people buy new clothes ahead of Baishakh. In fact, people, youths in particular, are rushing to the fashion houses to buy traditional attires.
Fairs, cultural performances and traditional meals are an intrinsic part of the Pahela Baishakh celebrations. On the auspicious day people dress up in their traditional attires and sing and dance along the Bengali classical and folk tunes. Various other cultural and art performances, like poetry recitation, singing and dramatic representations are also performed during the mass gatherings.
Earlier It was customary to clear up all dues on the last day of Chaitra. On the next day, or the first day of the New Year, landlords would entertain their tenants with sweets. On this occasion there used to be fairs and other festivities. In due course the occasion became part of domestic and social life, and turned into a day of merriment. Traders and businessmen used to invite their customers to share sweets and renew their business relationship with them. This tradition is still practised, especially by jewellers.
The Bangla calendar was introduced by Akbar, the great Mughal emperor, in order to facilitate collection of land tax in an effective manner. Akbar’s wisdom and foresight led him to effect this innovation, for he was strongly motivated to put the Sube Bangala – a part of the subcontinent that was always bent on breaking the shackles of domination at every opportunity – under permanent Mughal rule.
He made the New Year to coincide with the end of the harvesting season so that the peasants did not feel the burden of paying taxes. Though there had been other calendars in vogue before Akbar, thepresent solar calendar owes its origin to his initiative. Pahela Boishakh, the first day of the Bangla calendar, is indeed a momentous occasion in the life of each and every Bangali. To every Bangali, young and old, rich and poor, wise and ignorant, it is a time of gaiety to be celebrated with great gusto. It is enjoyed in every possible manner, an occasion which enables us, in the words of Tennyson, to drink life to the lees.’
It is a pity that a few orthodox Muslims in our country, out of sheer ignorance, look down upon this Nababarsha festival, simply because they consider it to be a festival of non-Muslim origin. But there is no shadow of doubt that the Bangla calendar that we follow today was introduced by the Muslims in this sub-continent.
The Bengali Calendar was further modified and reformed by a Committee headed by the celebrated scholar Dr. Muhammad Shahidullah under the auspices of the Bangla Academy in 1967 AD. The Committee recommended that the Bengali months from Baisakh through Bhadra would consist of 31 days, and the months from Aswin through Chaitra would have 30 days. But it still had some problems as the dates did not correspond to the Gregorian calendar every year. It still had some lacunae; as a sovereign state we had to have absolute correspondence between the Gregorian calendar and the Bangla calendar. So another expert committee constituted by Bangla Academy made further recommendations in 1993 which established absolute correspondence between the Bangla calendar and the Gregorian calendar
The tragedy is, we have a vibrant and polished culture, but we hardly take notice of it, we hardly celebrate and cherish it. Just days before the grand celebration of Pahela Baishakh, this writer asked many people to mention the names of Bengali months and to my utter surprise, I came to discover that most of them could not remember the months properly in their proper order. Such kind of attitudes and ignorance also question our claim that we celebrate Baishkah to uphold our cultural root. Otherwise the kind of fervor and spontaneity exhibited by youths of this country on Pahela Baishakh is really commendable. Pahela Baishakh is strongly related to our cultural identity. And it is our responsibility to show proper respect to our culture and act accordingly. We must not forget that the culture of a nation is something that reveals and upholds its identity to the people within and outside its borders. What we need is Baishakh not just of songs and dances and panta bhaat but to understand and celebrate the values that make us Bengalis. These values are more authentic than the saree and punjabi and the face painted expressions of our national identity
While in urban areas the Bengali calendar is fast losing its importance in rural areas it is as important as ever. In the villages Pahela Boishakh is very closely related to life. Celebrations are simple and more rooted. Children run around and enjoy life in its basic forms. The relatives meet- sharing anecdotes, sharing food, sharing ones unique intellectual and cultural identity with each other. In the city this simplicity seems to have been exploited using our youth’s love for their roots. Let us not forget Pahela Baishakh activites in Dhaka is targeted mainly towards the brimming youth. Not that it is a bad thing. It is highly important to get our youth, our citizens more interested and hungry for our roots and culture. Hence Pahela Baishakh for most of the visitors is Panta Bhaat, Nagordola rides and the Baul’s music. But our celebrations are more diverse and not just Baul and Lalon, Ilish maach and Panta bhaat.
Bengalis are the great social mixers and hyper emotional so we have been more moved by devotional songs than scriptures. We would rather do the more important things in life like raising a family, getting them educated. The colonial era also produced a high number of educated middle-class and the zamindary system which alienated them from the poorer social classes so today’s middle-class has no empathy for the poor, no cultural connection with them and are some of the most intolerant people on earth. We must not refuse to endorse modernity’s principles which include tolerance, engagement and respect for human rights.
We have to bring into focus all that has more to do with Bangladesh and bring them to public limelight, giving people an opportunity to judge for themselves what they have been missing or may lose. Let us start the year 1430 on a special note. Let us make it a point to heighten the experience of culture in our society. Only through awareness can we celebrate Pahela Baishakh in the real sense of the term.
Here’s wishing our readers and their families «Shubha Nababarsha”!
The writer is Senior Assistant Editor of The Business Post
