Dussehra is one of the major Hindu festivals of India, which is celebrated throughout the country with great enthusiasm and zeal. This festival occurs in the lunar month of Ashwayuja in September or October months of every year. People all over the country participate in this festival in their own way. Dussehra has some different names are called Dasara, Vijayadashami, and Navratri. Literally the name Navratri has two meanings first half nav means nine and other half Ratri means night so it is basically a nine night’s festival. The name Vijayadashami also indicates two meanings Vijaya means victory and Dashami means ten i.e., after the battle of nine days victory was acquired on the tenth day. There are two different chronicles behind this festival. One is lord Rama killed the ten heads, king Ravana and another one is the goddess Durga killed the demon called Mahishasura. Both chronicles show us the good won against the bad.
Chronicle of Lord Rama:
Long ago the lord Rama went to the forest to live for 14 years along with brother Lakshman and wife Sita. One day Sita saw a golden deer in that forest and she loves that. The site asks her husband, Lord Rama to catch that deer for her. Rama accepted and gone for it, but it was the demon called Marich who planned that Rama and Lakshman went out by leaving Sita alone. Rama didn’t come for a long time, so Lakshman went to search Rama at that time Sita stays alone. When they both left the ten heads, king Ravana came to Sita for alms as a saint. Sita came out with alms to give that saint, but he is not a real saint, he kidnapped Sita and took her to Lanka.
Rama goes to a search with the army of Vanaras after knowing the truth. Hanuman the faithful devotee of Rama finds Sita at Ashoka tree in Lanka and conveys the same to Lord Rama. After knowing the information Rama decides to battle and went to Lanka with the army of Vanaras. The battle was started and going during the time of battle, Rama made many attempts to kill Ravan but they all failed because Ravan couldn’t be killed by any weapon that is boon for him.
So Rama prayed to goddess Durga for help she gifted a powerful weapon to kill Ravana by using the weapon Rama killed the king Ravana and rescued his wife Sita. The whole battle took a period of nine days of the tenth day the king Ravana has died and that day the Indians celebrated Dussehra because the evil-minded demon has died.
A chronicle of goddess Durga:
Many years ago, there was one demon called Mahishasura. The name Mahisha means bison he was born in the form of a bison. For being a powerful demon he decided to occupy all the three worlds in the universe, so he starts to pray Lord Brahma for several years to acquire a boon to fulfill his dreams. The Lord Brahma impressed with the Mahishasura’s prayers and appeared to his later Mahishasura asked for a boon that no man in this universe was not able to kill me and Lord Brahma accepted his wish. Mahishasura had a strong feeling that no woman can defeat him like a man so he wishes that boon.
After that Mahishasura tortured everyone, even Lord Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva also but they were not able to stop him because of that boon. Due to his rudeness, they thought about the way to defeat him they got one idea. The only way to defeat him is to use a woman so they all combined and created goddess Durga with their special powers.
The goddess Durga blessed with the powers of all the three gods and she started the war against the bison Mahishasura. The war continued for nine days and on the tenth-day goddess Durga killed the demon Mahishasura and that day we called Vijayadashami or Dussehra and the nine days battle is called Navratri.
Celebrations:
People celebrate the festival in different styles based on their region and their traditions. Everyone worships the goddess Durga in those nine days with nine names. The goddess Durga is having nine different embodiments in these Navratri festivals like Shakti, Bhadra Kali, Jagadamba, Annapurna, Sarva Mangala, Bhairavi, Chandika, Lalita, Bhavani, and Mookambika. People arrange goddess Durga statues at homes or in public places and make Puja to the embodiments all day in Navratri.
After completion of Navratri people drop the statues in the river or ocean and say goodbye to the goddess. And that last day people will burn the statue of the ten heads, king Ravana and the statue of demon Mahishasura and finish their celebrations with this event. We observe one thing in both Chronicles that is always good wins against bad and god or goddess wins against evil-minded demons. The battles are only for protecting Dharma so let’s walk in the same way to protect Dharma. It is very important for everyone to know the fact and follow.
