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Writer's pictureLalit Kishore

Happy Karam Parva: Tribal harvest festival of verve and fertility

Today, received good wishes and greetings from facebook friends from the eastern states on the occasion of Karam Parva.


Karam Parva, the harvest festival dedicated to Karam Deva - the deity of fertility and youthfulness - is celebrated with verve and gusto in Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh besides the tribals of Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Odisha and West Bengal on the 11th day of a full moon (Purnima) of the Hindu month of Bhadon or Bhadra.


During the period of the festival, people sing and dance together in groups to the drumbeat. Girls celebrate the festival for welfare, friendship and sisterhood by exchanging a jawa flower.


Some of the collective activities don the festival are as follows.


  • Planting of nine type of seeds in basket (Jawa) by girls of habitations and taking care of these seeds for a week and do fasting as well sing praises of Karam Devta

  • Going to the jungle accompanied with a group of drummers to cut a few branches of the Karam tree after worshiping it and performing sacrifice offering with liquor to the deity

  • Ritual dancing with a yellow bloom tucked on ears

  • Offering Hariya to all as energizing tonic to wish good physical and mental health before community feast

  • Immersing the karam branch in the river or a water body


The ENVIS Centre, Ministry of Environment & Forest, GOI in its post of today writes, "At the evening, when the worship is over, dancing and signing go all through the night. The entire plateau resounds with dance of damsel, song of spirit and joy of

. It is indeed a rare example of such a vital and vibrant youth festival. At the same time, the unmarried girls celebrate the Jawa festival, which has its own kind of dance and songs. This is held mainly with an expectation of fertility and better household. The unmarried girls decorate a small basket with germinating seeds. It is believed that the worship for good germination of the grains would increase the fertility as well."

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