A Vibrant Village Jatre

India is perhaps the most colorful country in the world and certainly is a photographer's delight. Just walk down a busy street or a market and shoot and you will end up with a bunch of incredibly colorful snaps.

Not only India is diverse in terms of natural bounty as well as topography, Indians themselves are diverse in their facial characteristics, physical attributes etc.
And their dress sense invariably veers towards extreme and vivid colors.

I was on my way out of Raichur when I rode into a village where a Jatre was going on.  Jatre - a word with its root in the Sanskrit word 'Yatra' - is typically held annually in many villages in Karnataka to worship their local deities.

But a jatre is more a cultural festival than a religious event. It is the time when farmers forget their problems and spend time happily with their family and friends. In fact, many of them go on a shopping spree. Besides essential commodities, they purchase clothes for the whole year for all the family members and spend the evenings watching plays. Professional drama troupes camp during the jatre and stage plays to entertain the crowd.

The jatre is symbolic of the cultural bonding that has prevailed for centuries between people of different communities. While urban India is changing fast and cloning itself to look like any other messed-up modern city in the world it is gladdening to witness the preservation of customs and traditions in rural India.

But the relentless march of technology cannot be halted. There are changes happening in the villages too. The cell phone is as ubiquitous in rural areas as it is in the cities.

There are three types of social gatherings in rural Karnataka. They are Santhes, Parishes and of course, Jatres.

 “Santhe” is the Kannada form of the Sanskrit term Samstha, meaning an assemblage of persons. Parishe and Jatre are also assemblages but each has its own significance. Santhes are temporary markets located at sites which can be easily reached by farmers from nearby villages. A Santhe typically is a market where both farm and household goods are sold.

Where as a Parishe is also a market but with the difference that in a Parishe a single commodity is auctioned and bought. Bangalore has its own Parishe - the Kadlekai (Groundnut) Parishe - held annually near Bull Temple at Basavanagudi in the month of February.

Will these rural traditions survive the onslaught of modernizing influences or will they gradually disappear into pages of history?

Portions of the text content was sourced from these articles:

http://www.ourkarnataka.com/Articles/starofmysore/hsk/jatre08.htm

http://www.hindu.com/2009/01/23/stories/2009012350950200.htm