Raksha-bandhan is celebrated in
most parts of India as bonding of love between brother & sister. Another festival which is similar to Raksha-bandhan is Bhai-Dooj. In spite of such a pious festival being
celebrated, how can there be so many incidents of sexual harassment, rape,
murders etc. In the context of increased
violence against women and violence in general, this festival needs serious redefinition.
Quoting Wikipedia: "It is an
ancient Hindu festival that ritually celebrates the love and duty between
brothers and their sisters. The
sister performs a Rakhi ceremony, then
sister prays to express her love and her
wish for the well being of her brother;
in return, the brother ritually pledges to protect and take care of
his sister under all circumstances."
We mostly agree with the above definition. There is one thing,
we can observe in above definition, that it seems to be relationship between one brother with one sister. This seems
to be bottleneck, that is why, the fragrance of the festival is not able to
flourish in society.
Sister worry about them and their brother, while brother worry about them and their sister. It just does not take into account of the
others. It seems individualistic. The 'society' (or 'sansar' or 'world')
component is missing from the festival. One of my senior colleague mentioned,
that whey you pray, you should pray for others and not for yourself. Then only,
your prayer will be listened too. It
also reminds of Vivekananda Chicago speech. He began his speech with
salutation, "Sisters and brothers of America!".
In the light of above discussion, this festival
needs to be re-looked and redefined such that it includes all. A sister should pray for the well being of all other brothers as well, while at the
same time a brother should pledges to protect all other sisters as well. In this model,
one sister worries for rest (n-1) sisters as well, and will be protected by
rest (n-1) brothers as well. At the same
time, one brother will get the wishes of rest (n-1) sisters as well, and need
to protect rest (n-1) sisters as well.
All brothers and sisters, if they abide to this
model, and insist to their
sisters/brothers to do the same during the festival, then there will no
scope of violence against women.
Thanks for reading. Your comments are most welcome.