On the coming 24^th, not only Trichur, but the whole world is celebrating Thrissur Pooram, the globe’s most enchanting sight. While an exclusive reporting of the Pooram event, standing amidst a fervent mass is seemed to be a cry for the moon, a book on Thrissur Pooram has been released by a woman journalist recently. Gayatri Sundaram appraises it as the ultimate answer to all the queries regarding Thrissur Pooram and emphasizes that it has been debased all the soppy and corny verbosities of the media hypes on event reporting.

(Photo Courtesy: Mr.Jayson Joseph Chacko)

‘What do you say my girl? Off to Trichur to report Thrissur Pooram.! Kidding? Go and see what about that match in Mohali. Chalo Chalo..” Growled, my News Editor. A Keralite, that is too, a Trichurian, how can I sit quietly before my desktop when my hometown overwhelms in the fervor of Pooram?

For years, I had been waiting to get a chance to be one among the media persons atop the scaffolds before the mighty Vadakunnatha Temple. But never had they sent a female one out of us to report Pooram. So I contented with what I got as scraps of the happenings of Pooram on my desk and ornamenting those caterpillar lines with caparisons and parasols as banners and sub-heads. By scribbling superfluous captions under the photographs of ‘vedikettu’ and ‘kudamatam’ as ‘thunderous, dazzling, magnanimous, feast of colors’ etc, I found solace from my depression.

Scarcely, when on leave I tried to perceive it with all my five senses and all my three mind levels. But my parents stopped me, ‘no, you are not going. After all you are a girl.” I asked myself and to my friends in Trichur, what would happen if a girl went to the premises of Trichur pooram. But no answer could satisfy my quest.

Feeling the Pooram effect

After marriage, anyways, I could get by there with my husband and my cousin brother walking by my either sides– Never as a media person, but as a mere spectator without any direct link, (like Vadakkunnathan). I was drifting along the waves of humans spread on the Swaraj Round and Thekkinkadu Maidan where the majestic Pooram rocks. Once a colleague commented “ Kerala is always in a celeb mood, always festivals, a number of poorams, velas…what is this extravaganza? What is there to see?”

Yes, there was nothing particular to see and comment. I could experience Pooram as a feel as if I was floating or drifting weightless like a cloud. Flying high without fluttering, being one with the mystic lot. The Swaraj Round, usually buzzing with the neck-break plies of vehicles lie flat for the free moon walk. One cannot expect to sit on the concrete roads of the Swaraj Round, near the Manikantanal Pandal where the Parmekavu Devi stands atop the caparisoned elephant royally to watch the bedazzling vedikkettu. But I sat there. When the dusk spread the canopy of the city, the mass moved towards south deviating from the usual one-way to uphold the world’s most enchanting sight — ‘kudamattam’, the arena where the divine sisters in a tet-a-tet.

In front of the southern gate of Vadakunnatha Temple, the mammoth gatherings were skirted by the caparisoned mammoths, we too were thawing. People atop the buildings could perceive the vast ocean of humans hemmed on either side by the myriad colored parasols which were being changed in rapid succession. I too became a jot of that great ocean. But suddenly I felt something crawling on my belly, and then it came to a patting on my back. When looked around I could hardly see a female body. From the four sides I had been stripped and scanned by gluttonous eyes. Foul smell of sweat and panparag kindled the ambit and I was stifled. I looked around in panic to get out of that vortex. I told my husband and my brother in a hurry that I must go. They were not ready to listen, but when repeated, my husband said, “ no way to go out. Stay there for some more time.” My limbs were tethered to the entangled mass. For the first time, I felt helpless. I thought of crying aloud. My husband and my brother tried a lot to get me out. But it was a cry for the moon.

No one can get out of that array. You might have seen the photograph of ‘kudamattom’ where the whole world congregates.  Subsequently, if anything happen to anyone among the crowd, he will have to succumb to ‘come– what may’.

Ambulances, fire engines, police jeeps all in their first gears are ready grumbling hither and thither but how can the victim be out. My musings pondered across the ghastly feel I was undergoing.

After that episode we began to float again towards the western side, the air ploughed with the piercing smell of arracks and its foreign brands. I could see youths enjoying as if they were going to die after this day. I could see kids revel in new clothing giggling boisterously with the sounds of whistles and bursting balloons. I could see middle aged men searching for a chance to slant upon a feminine physique. I could see caparisoned pachyderms walking fast, shaking their proud heads to reach for the next ‘ezhunnellippu’. I could see the street vendors blowing whistles and hurling the fluorescent watches up when they meet a kid, but I never met with any woman or girl enjoying the festival. If anyone was there, they were all in a vigil to protect their ‘fragile body’.

The visual (media) treats

That was years before. By the onrush of visual media, things have got a sea change. Novel sheds for fixing the camera have been shot up in different points in Thekkinkadu, where the reporters along with cameramen could carry out their duties in a healthy and competitive way as the participants of Thrissur Pooram. Still, while narrating the past glories and stories of Pooram, precariously weaving the strands of myths and beliefs, the ear-bashers often get slipped off.

You can find plenty of write-ups, articles and books by renowned writers depicting this great symphony. A number of canvases and brush strokes will tell you what this lofty event renders, but never they tell you why it is such a harmonious blend of myriad aspects. Hardly any one  could catch its chore which is something saucy  to reach a distant appreciator. While carving out the historical cult, the myths intervene. When it comes to the narrated myths having no written manuscripts, the historical analysis turns it down. Thrissur Pooram is a whirl pool – one cannot get out of its magnanimity and convolution not so easily. To amass it you have to be there as an iota of that vast sea of colors and cultures and that will be almost a gas!

Though the channels air live telecast of Thrissur Pooram and the news papers and magazines portrait it in variety shades and verbal extravaganza, Thrissur Pooram does not reach the public in its full zeal and gist. Perhaps, a new book on Thrissur Pooram released last week (prior to Thrissur Pooram) can justify the festival up to the brim of its factuality. But what amazed me to agape is that it was written by a young lady journo!!!.

‘Thrissur Pooram’ by P.K.Priya

The book titled ‘Thrissur Pooram’ written by Ms.P.K.Priya, is in fact a ferreting through the zealous mob and entanglements of myths plus history. While going through the book, I could figure out a lot of things untold, unexplored and ignored unto date. Ms.Priya starts the verbal Pooram by bringing us close to the unraveled truth behind the significance and uniqueness of Thrissur Pooram amongst the mess of Poorams in the land of Kerala. When other Temple Poorams and even the regional festivals are being celebrated in the country according to the domains and the dominants, only Trichur Pooram is celebrated with all its exceptionality and distinctiveness unaltered in the time pass by.

Ms.Priya glides through the historical voyage exploring the controversial history of the ‘who-dun-it issue’ of the origin of Thrissur Pooram.  When History takes us back to Sakthan Thampuran and again back to a Pooram conducted in the Trichur town. Priya reconciles it by connoting Sakthan Thampuran  as the ‘mentor’ or ‘architect’ of Trichur and Trichur Pooram. The one-day long Aarattupuzha pooram under the cantankerous autopsy of the Kerala Brahmins (Namboodiris) when moved aside to give way to a cultural highlight par excellence, the Time and Motion were bowing before the prowess of a decisive and firm administrator. Temples in and around Thrissur were regular participants of that religious exercise until they were once denied entry by the responsible chief of the Peruvanam domain, known for its Brahmin supremacy.

As an act of retaliation and also in a bid to alleviate their wounded feelings, Sakthan Thampuran the ruler of the erstwhile Cochin State invited all these temples to bring their deities to Thrissur where they could pay obeisance to Lord Vadakunnathan . Perhaps, there is no other festival in Kerala that draws such an unbelievable number of people to a single event like the newly mended form of Pooram better known to the globe as Trichur Pooram.

Thrissur Pooram – The Sakthan cult

It has been dealt with fine and sharp whit while we go through the rituals of Pooram including the other eight participant temples. It is amazing to note the worthy rites performed during the ‘madathilvaravu’ of Thiruvambadi temple on behalf of the historic facts relating to Brhmaswam Madhom where the real Brahmins are being moulded in the present era. Priya’s ‘Thrissur Pooram’ emphasizes the truth a hundred times that Trichur belongs to Sri Vdakunnathan (Lord Siva) and the Pooram credits to its one and only King, RamaVarma Sakthan Thampuran. It tells how yogathiripad ruled the town and the temple together and what the basic requirements to be a yogathiri were. When the qualities gave way to autocracy and supremacy over the lower castes the King regained the power from them. Even now, Thrissur Pooram is being taken out in solemn procession through the ways paved and designed by the King without even a minor deviation.

From the Kodiyettam day (launching ceremony) to the Pooram day, all the deities are being carried on by elephants and they roam about the whole domains with parayeduppu including the inter-temple visits. The ten temples participating in the Pooram carry out this ritual alike. The two prominent temples (Thiruvambadi and Paramekkavu) under which other eight neighboring temples are strategically coded so as to segregate the functions in harmony by bringing even the people from remote villages to the pooram city. It is nothing but Sakthan’s long vision to deploy the whole natives of Trichur under one parasol of unity. This signifies a miniature succor to the multi-cultural and multi-linguistic embarrassments of India.

Exploring the untold and misinterpreted

Sample vedikkettu is another event which lures the mass to the Pooram city. But even the natives are almost unaware of what it signifies. In fact it was a rehearsal of the original Pooram conducted before the Royal family of the Palace for the ‘final consensus’ from the King (Kolothumpooram). But it came to a halt even before the palace being undertaken by the Government in 1964. It has now transformed to be a mere exhibition of fire works. Thekkotirakam is another episode of the Pooram which is also a sign of commemoration of the obeisance given to Pazhayannur Bhagavathy by the King. That is why the elephants perambulate the statue of the King which is sited where the Bhagavathy had been installed once.

After the ‘kodiyettam’ every participant deities are on a roving and on the Pooram day, all the idols were being anointed in a sacred bath in the Padinjare chira, the pond in the Brahmaswam madhom. But now only Ayyanthole Bhagavathi is the only participant who is undertaking the ‘aaraatu’(sacred bath) in that pond.

The first Pooram which comes to Vadakkunanatha temple is of Kanimangalam Sastha who is considered to be the Devaguru Brihaspathi. Hence the deity never gives obeisance to Lord Siva like the other nine deities. But the second one who comes in to Vadakunnatha Temple is Naithalakavu Bhagavathi with whom Sakthan was very much fond of. So the right of proclamation of the Pooram festival has been given to Naithalakavu Bhagavathi. When Kolothumpooram was there, it is said that, only when the Naithalakavu Bhagavathi comes in Sakthan used to stand up from his seat to pay obeisance..  A heart-rending narration of the legacy behind this particular piety towards this Goddess has been beautifully depicted in the book.

Every meticulous aspect regarding the participant temples is emphatically treated here. Priya says,  Ayyanthole Bhagavathy temple is the pioneer in Panchavadyam to be included in Thrissur Pooram. There is the mentioning of the recent event in which the age-old Ilanji tree in the temple when fell down, it has been uplifted and re-rooted with the concurrence of the natives beyond religion. Another participant Chembukavu Bhagavthy, sibling of Ayyanthole Bhagavathy is prone to head ache and hence leaves the Pooram premise before the sun reaches the mid-sky and She comes to meet Her sister to exchange sandal paste (for headache) to gingelly oil. Lalur Bhagavathi, the other partaker bears  some internal links with Vadakkunnatha temple. Once in a year the priest of Vadakunnatha Temple comes to this lovely circular sanctum sanctorum to carry out the daily rites. As far as the most revered Naithalakavu Bhagavathy is concerned,it is Her blowing of the Conch shell that proclaims the global festival Thrissur Pooram. Another accomplice of the Pooram Panamukkumpally Sastha has a legacy of the rule of Thekke Madhom. There is also the mentioning of the puranic links of Karamukku temple as it was the place where Khara the brother of Soorpanekha had once carried out his penance and hence the name Karamukku.

A mote juste

A perspiring research of two years lacing with the pulses of Pooram and dissolving into the sand grains of Thekkinkadu, by an enthusiastic journo has hatched this historic manuscript out, worthy to keep by any one who bears an aesthetic mindset- Be it a theist or atheist. Even though known to be the cultural hub of the State, most of the Press in Kerala  takes care not to send their female reporters to the site of the Pooram. At this juncture, this vignette of Pooram shades scribbled by Ms.Priya deserves a hats-off. In her simple prologue she says, it is not a journo’s perspective worked out here, but that of a mere spectator.

At a time media celebrates Thrissur Pooram in verbal and visual extravaganza, this book simply glides through every finite aspect of Pooram from its history through the symphony of temple orchestra,peppy showers of little poorams, the careful observances of time schedules, prowess of caparisoned elephants, the magnificent and pomp fire works, parasols woven with imported fabrics, the last minute climax of kudamaattom, the supremely crafted pandals, the healthy and unhealthy competitions of Thiruvambady and Paramekkavu, the traps and pits they play one another, the mammoth handovers of majestic elephants and so on to the Pooram exhibition that gathers the financial assistance to this marvelous event.

More than the media hypes Pooram is to be felt and experienced, to be with the Pooram is the way to celebrate it. Subsequently, the know-how plays an add-on for its festive mood and Priya’s ‘Thrissur Pooram’ serves it well.

Related posts:

1. Thrissur Pooram — Curtains raising…
2. Machad Mamankam – Unique and traditional
3. Garnishing the Cultural Capital Trichur
4. Caricature artist Jayaraj Warrier felicitated
5. HOLI can be HOLY