GAI JATRA 2075/18

Gai Jatra is a type of festival which is only celebrated in Nepal. Gai means cow and jatra means festival. Gai Jatra is mainly celebrated in kathmandu. It is celebrated in the month of bhadra. On this day, people in whose family someone has died walk around the street with a cow. If they do not have cow, they dress up as cows.

Gai Jatra is also called Sa Paru. It is mainly celebrated by hindus.The streets are very colorful on the day of gai jatra.  It is celebrated to diminish the sadness from the death of family members. During the festival, cows are marched in the streets.

 It is a ralley of cows. In this year it is celebrated on 27 august 2018. However, the modern form of celebration of Gai Jatra came into existence in the medieval period of Nepal during the reign of Malla Kings. The present form of Gai Jatra with humorous acts, parody, comedy and was started by then King of Kathmandu Pratap Malla. He made Rani Pokhari (Pond) in the heart of Kathmandu and build a temple in the middle of the same pond.

After the cow procession is over, in the afternoon, everyone takes part in another tradition in which the participants dress up and wear masks. There also people enjoy the moments with songs, jokes, mockery and humors until late evening.

 

Gai Jatra is a festival which enables people to accept the reality of death and to prepare oneself for the life after death. It heals the grief and sorrow, at least a little, when people see the cow possession and realize people die, and we are not alone in the country who lost our loved ones.