Taste of Life: How Ganeshotsav became a celebration of unity, equality

Food is an important intermediary that passes national, religious, social, and caste-based identities to the masses.

On “Pithori Amavasya” in 1932, Janakibai Apte, the social reformer from Ahmednagar, invited around fifty women with their children to the premises of a local school. The women belonged to the so-called “lower castes” and lived on the outskirts of the town. Members of “Hind Sevika Sangh”, an organisation that Apte had established, served the women and the children milk and a laddoo each. Apte then gave a short speech explaining the importance of the “Amavasya”, Mother’s Day, and Ganesh Chaturthi. She urged them to celebrate the festival by bringing home an idol of Lord Ganpati and worshipping him according to Hindu rituals. She then handed each woman a sack containing rice, dal, and jaggery. She asked them to make “modaks” (sweet dumplings) as an offering to God.

Apte continued this tradition of requesting Dalit women to celebrate Ganesh Chaturthi and giving them food grains and jaggery for at least a decade. The initiative was applauded by political leaders like NC Kelkar and Marathi newspapers like “Kesari” and “Dnyanaprakash”. They wished that a similar drive was undertaken in Pune.

In August 1936, Mr Nilkanth Oke, president of the “Nutan Shikshan Mandal”, donated a rupee and a saree each to twenty women from the so-called “lower castes” in the month of “Shravan”.

A week later, a wealthy businessman from Varanasi, who had been visiting the city, donated sacks of jowar, rice, salt, and jaggery to several Dalit families. A letter published in “Dnyanaprakash” on August 18, 1936, was quick to point out that such donations were better made a week before Ganesh Chaturthi so that they could be used for cooking during the festival. It also pointed out that even though men from the “lower castes” were celebrating Ganeshotsav outside their homes, it was the need of the hour to educate women from the so-called “lower caste” communities about important Hindu festivals.

The Peshwas celebrated the Ganesh Chaturthi with great aplomb in Pune. In the mid-nineteenth century, noble families like Kibe, Mujumdar, and Mehendale were known for their lavish celebrations where common people could participate. The re-invention of the public festival of Ganpati could be attributed to the communal tensions in the early 1890s. Newspaper and Bombay Police reports indicate that although the festival began as a show of opposition to the local Muslim festival, it developed into a powerful instrument of nationalist sentiment against foreign rule.

The perceived threat of “foreign” religions resulted in a new discourse that called for sweeping changes in Hindu society. In the twentieth century, while Brahminism was being reinvented, attempts were made to forge a pan-Indian Hindu identity. The nationalist sentiment associated with Ganeshotsav relied heavily on the new Hindu identity that was being constituted.

Several Ganesh mandals in the 1920s declared that they aimed to promote union and solidarity among all sections of the Hindu community; improve the condition of all classes of the Hindu society and protect and promote the interests and rights of Hindus. The rising number of communal riots after 1920 accelerated the process of inclusion of the so-called “lower castes” in the Hindu identity. Abolition of untouchability was seen as an important tool for the strengthening of the Hindus.

The caste fault lines were nowhere more conspicuous than in Pune. The emergence and the popularity of the Satyashodhak Samaj and the non-Brahmin “Chhatrapati Jalsa” made the schism more visible. The heightened tussle between the conservatives and progressives over issues like inter-caste marriages, entry for all in Hindu temples, and free education for girls, resulted in darkening the religious tone of the Ganeshotsav.

In an editorial in “Kesari” (September 18, 1894), Bal Gangadhar Tilak had insisted that members of various castes like the “Sali”, the “Kumbhar”, the “Mali”, and the “Sonar” participated in the festival. According to him, the festival was aimed at forging Hindu solidarity and promoting patriotism.

Mandals organising the festival were formed according to their localities, castes, and occupations and many mandals belonging to the so-called “lower castes” were established in early twentieth-century Pune. They looked at the Ganeshotsav celebrations as a means to gain an equal status in society. According to Kondadev Shreeram Kholwadikar, president of the organising committee of the Clarkes Road Ganeshotsav Mandal in Mumbai, the celebration was a tool for the unity between Brahmins and the “untouchables”.

An editorial in “Dnyanaprakash” (September 15, 1927) mentioned that several Ganeshotsav mandals in Maharashtra had taken initiatives to include members of the so-called “lower castes” in the festivities. According to the editorial, the progressive thought of an inclusive Ganeshotsav in Pune had made the conservatives sulk in silence. But it also cautioned that a lot needed to be done in the city to further the cause of equality.

Ganesh idols worshipped by members of the so-called “lower castes” had to be immersed in wells or water bodies reserved for them. In 1928, Shri Chokhamela Boarding in Jalgaon created a stir by immersing the Ganesh idol in a well-used by the so-called “upper castes”. Men and boys of various castes took part in the immersion ceremony, and they all partook in the “prasad” together. The news soon reached Pune and progressive leaders immediately appealed for a similar measure in the city.

Mr Govind Mahadev Bapat organised the Ganeshotsav in his “Private English Classes” every year from 1922 when Dalits were invited to be part of the celebrations. Even though men, and sometimes women, from all castes celebrated the festival and ate “prasad” together in educational institutions like The Training College for Men, Fergusson College, and Deccan College, reports in “Dnyanaprakash” indicate that in the 1930s, even though various mandals “allowed” the “untouchables” to take a “darshan” of the deity from a distance, their offerings to Ganpati were not accepted. They were also not given the “prasad”.

This had already become a contentious issue when several “untouchables” were denied equal rights to worship by a Ganeshotsav Mandal in Dadar in 1928. Members of the “Samata Samaj Sangh” like Mr Devrao Naik had decided to involve the so-called “untouchables” in the festivities that were then restricted to the “upper castes”. Many membership donations were collected from the “untouchables” for this public festival. They naturally expected equal rights to worship. However, the conservatives did not allow them to enter the premises.

After a commotion started at the pandal, Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar and Prabodhankar Keshav Sitaram Thackeray intervened. A compromise was reached where a rampart was erected around the idol. Everybody was asked not to go beyond the boundary. The “untouchables” gave their offerings and received the “prasad” in return.

When Ganeshotsav was celebrated for the first time in 1934 in the newly flourishing locality of Erandwane, the organisers were quick to mention that the celebrations were suitable for the “educated” and “cultured” families that lived there. That also meant that the festival was exclusive to “upper caste” families.

This desire to maintain “purity” was apparent in several programmes organised during Ganeshotsav. The Jeevdaya Mandal from Mumbai declared that it worked for the unification of Hindus and called for a complete ban on cow slaughter. DD Palshikar, the secretary of the Mandal, was in Pune in 1937 and delivered lectures promoting vegetarianism and temperance, qualities he believed were important to become a “good” Hindu. According to the report published by the organisation, inspired by Palshikar’s speeches, 146 men vowed to embrace vegetarianism, 121 men vowed never to indulge in animal slaughter, and 17 people gave up alcohol.

In 1938, Apte’s “Hind Sevika Samiti” distributed food grains and jaggery to “untouchable” women in Pune. I do not know how long this initiative continued in the city. But Ganeshotsav continues to bring forward the intrinsic connection between caste, gender, religion, nationalism, domesticity, and food.

Chinmay Damle is a research scientist and food enthusiast. He writes here on Pune’s food culture. He can be contacted at chinmay.damle@gmail.com