BHAKTAPUR: 'Visin Dyo Ya Lag Khang Lo Wan La, Bisyu Wane Mayak Swa Vaya La', meaning 'Bhimsen's penis lusts after the heart, is to be seen fleeing'. Now they are on the verge of extinction.
From the day of Falgun Shukla Ashtami to the full moon, the singers of Bhimsen Guthi used to sing such songs and bid farewell with the arrival of Holi. But now some locals are not aware that there are such songs of Dafa bhajan related to Fagu.
On the day of Falgun Shukla Ashtami, it is customary to take a three-foot-long, 30-inch-thick wooden linga to the Bramhayani river, bathe it in the river, carry it on one's shoulders, and carry it around the house and shops around the Dattatraya temple in Tachpal. Although there is a tradition of devotees touching, giving alms and hanging on the temple board in the evening, the practice of turning the penis in the toll road is now disappearing.
According to the Newari tradition, it is a tradition to start phagu here after turning the penis, says Om Dhaubhadel, a culturologist from Bhaktapur. He says that even though the penis was kept in a vehicle without carrying it on the shoulder for a few years, now the tradition of years has come to an end.
This festival is also considered as a festival of love by singing a song that means ‘I am in a trance, there is a mustard garland all over the window, I need the same young woman, I will not eat rice until I find that young woman’.
The Dafa hymns in Nepali language, such as 'Abirya Holi Tanchaya La Lyase, Abiram Chagun Khwa: Hisi Dayeka B', meaning 'Abirko Holi, Risayo Ki Taruni, Abirle Timro Muhar Hissi Banu Ki', show love. On the day of Holi, the practice of proposing love to the girl you like through hymns has now disappeared.
Bhimsen Guthi has traditionally celebrated Holi with love and sex. Every year, from the day of Phagun Shukla Ashtami to Phagu Purnima, the Guthi has displayed the image of sexual intercourse by hanging the symbol of Bhimsen's penis and Draupadi's vagina in the Bhimsen temple. The locals also worship and visit the penis and vagina for seven days.
The wooden penis is considered to be Bhimsen's penis and the vaginal shaped hole made of red cloth is considered as Draupati's vagina. The people of Bhimsen and Draupadi have been preserving the symbol of penis and vagina as a sexual relationship and not as a perversion but as a cultural significance.
Shaking the penis hanging on the board penetrates the hole of the vagina shaped cloth and it is considered as sexual intercourse of Bhimsen and Draupadi. According to Keshari Kapali, a priest of the temple, Bhimsen has been hanging outside the Pati in the past few years.
Visitors shake Bhimsen's penis. For a week, the locals rub Bhimsen's penis on Draupadi's vagina. Cotton is hung on the top of the wooden penis. Visitors take cotton as a symbol of semen during intercourse between the penis and vagina. Priest Kapali says that there is a belief that family happiness and longevity can be achieved by visiting in this way.
Although the symbolically sex-related Phagu festival, i.e. Holi, is associated with Krishna and Pralhad in South Asia, it is also associated with the sexual intercourse of Bhimsen and Draupadi, especially in Bhaktapur. The Newar community goes to the Bhimsen temple to have a Guthi feast after hanging the chir swayagu, i.e. the penis, and a fair is held at the Bhimsen temple on Saturdays and Tuesdays throughout Holi.
"Sex is a necessity in life. Sex was in the time of God and it is in the time of man. There is a need for sex in animals and birds from Kirafatangra. Life is incomplete without sex. This tradition, which has been going on in the Bhimsen temple since time immemorial, has widened the importance of sex, ”said Kalucha Prajapati, 69, a local.
Not only men but also women come to observe and visit it, and those who come here shake the hanging penis on the basis of religious beliefs. On the evening of Phagupurnima, it is customary for a person to remove the penis from the Bhimsen temple in front of the Dattatraya temple, carry it to the river at the Bramhayani temple, wash it and put it back in the temple. Then Holi ends.
According to Pujari Kapali, it is still believed that a person who carries a penis from the temple to the river will have a son that year. There is a different legend in Bhaktapur's Holi. According to Sanskrit scholar Om Dhaubhadel, in ancient times, a very sensual young man began to prey on the women he saw to satisfy his lust on a daily basis. After the women became intimidated with the man, a woman proposed to him for the purpose of punishing the lustful man and freeing him from intimidation.
After the lustful man came in front of her, the woman cut off the man's penis with a hidden home-made weapon and marched around the city to show that it was the man's penis. The frightened women rejoiced to get rid of the man. According to Dhaubhadel, there has been a trend of showing gender since then. The temple of Bhimsen was established in the 17th century by King Jagat Prakash Mall and it is estimated that the original style of Holi in Bhaktapur has been in vogue since that time.
According to Dhaubhadel, a cultural expert, this is further confirmed by the discovery of songs related to Holi written during the Malla period in 781 BS and 792 BS. It is said that the arrival of spring is from the month of Fagun and this time is considered as the time of sexual energy and love.
