Onam - An Equivocal Festival

ONAM - AN EQUIVOCAL FESTIVAL

T.G. Jacob

Onam, nostalgically characterized as the”national” festival of Kerala, is originally a festival of long duration like most Hindu ones. Even as late as the last century it lasted ten days. It is the lull, pleasant post- harvest time that reverberated with the noises, smells and colors of the festival the duration of which has effectively come down to a single day, or at the most three days, in the present days. As a festival it has kept up with systemic changes reflected in the changes in the consumption pattern during the festival. This is nothing exceptional, it has happened to all festivals. It has happened to Deepavali, Makara Sankranthi, Id, Holi et al. Our concern here is simply to point out certain ambiguities concerning the socio-cultural roots of this all important festival of Malayalam speaking people all over the world.

Mythologically, Onam is a celebration of the temporary visit of a long past chieftain who was buried alive by the machinations of the Brahminical supreme God Vishnu who had felt threatened by the all round happiness of the subject people of the chieftain known as Mahabali. Maha means great and bali means sacrifice. Semantically the term Mahabali is not a personalized name but denotes ritual sacrifice. Vishnu gives a boon to the sacrificed chieftain so that he is able to revisit his people once an year from the netherworld. The occasion of Onam is this visit. At the outset, the people celebrate the visit of this mythical hero coming to see how his people are faring. So the people are expected to be very happy, feast even if they have to sell their means of sustenance, and welcome him with flowers, dance, music, and games that showcase physical well being.

The other pole of this festival myth is the demise of an egalitarian social order in which all were equal, all were honest, and all were prosperous. This utopia was overturned by the Brahmin God through treachery and deception but the victim symbolized by the hero accepts his fate as a cosmic intervention and is gratified that he is allowed to come back once an year. The timing is important because the harvests typify plenty in an agricultural, pastoral society. The myth is a well regulated one. The demise of the old society happens under conditions of plenty but due to cosmic inevitability. The ushering in of the Brahminical order and value system degraded the people but it was pre-ordained. The folk hero had to be sacrificed but he is happy to be sacrificed because through his sacrifice he comes into contact with the supreme divine force.

Onam, viewed through the eyes of its folklore, marks the transition point from the pre-Aryan to the Aryan social order and world view. As is well known the pre-Aryan social order gave place to an incredibly vicious and debilitating social order which survived up to the 20^th century. The caste system in Kerala entailed not only total dispossession of the majority and untouchability but also other basic animal perceptions like sight and sound. The pre-Aryan matriarchal system was systematically undermined through generating bastard generations sans any patriarchal accountability among the most prominent section. The progressivism ascribed to Kerala society in modern times is mainly the product of reformation attempts in a society that was denounced by Vivekananda as “lunatic asylum.” It was no doubt an impressionistic characterization but his impressionistic reading was certainly to the point.

Thus Onam as a festival symbolizes the victory of Vedic ritualistic Brahminism, crushing of the pre-Aryan social system(s), and establishment of a new social, political and economic order with the most inhuman caste system as its basis. In this sense it is a historic defeat of the people that is being celebrated. The once an year return of the folk hero is a compromise of accommodation like the Bharani festival in the famous Kodungalloor Mother Goddess temple when the Dalits were allowed to visit their Goddess after she was co-opted by the Brahmins. The Dalits used to go to the temple on that day and violently abuse their Goddess for having shamelessly betrayed them to pander to the Brahmins until their processions/ songs (which are sexual abuses) were banned some years back on grounds of public display of obscenity. On this day oppressor castes women and girls used to be securely locked up because if any of them are chased and touched by the untouchables excommunication follows. And untouchables had the license to do it on that day.

Onam has also undergone quite a metamorphosis over the years, especially since the State and its people got wedged in to the global consumerist circuit as result of which it is culturally and numismatically being subjected to a continuous stream of shock therapy. The political class of all colors caught on to the possibilities of the festival with alacrity. They nationalized it as a “tourism week” with all sorts of mindless, gaudy pageants advertising a manufactured cultural ambience to international tourism. Folk and classical art forms had much earlier alreasy become capsule commodities for international touristic consumption. Then the popular festivals like Onam and boat races were added to the consumer package. This is one highly visible dimension of Onam in contemporary Kerala. The public show in the capital city draws millions of spectators every year, mainly composed of gaily dressed and painted women and children. The whole city becomes a mass theatre of the absurd, catering and devouring kitsch.

There is an even more universal dimension to the celebration of the festival today. This is mindless drunkenness. Since long Kerala has the dubious distinction of being the most drunken State. But there is nothing partial to Onam on this count. In Kerala a hartal or general shutdown is an equally good festival. The bandh day is meticulously prepared for. Sufficient quantity of liquor is stocked the previous day and friends assemble early and remain late celebrating the festival. That is why even a pitiably insignificant political group can call for a hartal and make it a ‘success.’ A hartal is more often a celebration than a protest. Hot headed fools and helpless people in emergency conditions may die on a hartal day but such things are only incidental. This can very possibly be taken as a bizarre manifestation of overwhelming irrational consumerism that turns values upside down and thrives by it. Onam is a more generalized performance in this regard. Mind you, the catharsis is only a physicalist experience; it leaves the mind as dull as or duller than ever.

The mass media is yet another catharsis. Forget the electronic media because it had always been mindlessly cathartic and is not capable of anything else. But the popular print media is involved in yet another nostalgia of utterly tragic proportions. Many of them, like Mathrubhumi bring out multi-volume Onam specials, which are mainly literary in content and nostalgic in style. Writers who lost touch with creative writing or any critical writing for decades proudly wash their fatty souls and give the filthy solution to the readers to drink. The readers spend good money to buy it and drink, and even discuss. It is good business for the media capitalists apart from contributing further to literary decadence, which is already in place since many years.