The gateway to wealth followed by enjoyment without any restriction

The entrance is perfectly decorated showing a pathway to the home, so that Goddess Laxmi will be very happy and visit the house and bless with wealth and prosperity.

Today is the last holy Thursday - called Manabasa Gurubara. Though we are not celebrating any occasion this year due to a family death, the restrictions have been in place all these days. We do have little choice, as its the lady who imposes all the restrictions and little we can do. But I also love the practice, that passes the learning to our next generation. A cultural heritage, that teaches so many values about life that need to be practiced in daily life. And most importantly it reflects the significance of the role of a woman in building the family, deserving every respect for what she does. Since 2019, this day (Manabasa Gurubara) is also listed in the ‘National List of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) of India’.

I have often argued with many people about Women empowerment - because I differ from how most people envision women empowerment. In my opinion, the women always are empowered and superior to men in every aspect of life - may be the men have better physical strength - but the lady has everything to steer that in her way. Now a days, people often refer Women empowerment as giving more power to the women in jobs, politics, but unfortunately they forget one thing - the role of women in building the family. From ancient times, in our culture, the women has the greatest role in shaping up the future of the family - it's often said that if the mother is perfect, then she will definitely bring up the kids teaching them values important for them to be successful in life. And there is nothing more valuable than that. For that reason, even though, my wife is an engineer, and could do a nice job earning same as me, we decided she take care of the family instead. She is very homely and loves to practice these rituals and I am happy that, my daughter is also learning these rituals and loves them, to carry these values to next generation.

The sacred text called the Lakshmi Purana teaches very important values - every women reads it today ( because if they recite this, they will go to heaven) and it teaches some lovely values on what the women should do and what not. Here is a gist from the entire story - translated into English here. I was able to find out this English version after lot of searches, so I recommend you read the entire story.

Many things are taboo for women during this period : giving Mahalakshmi’s Prasad to outsiders – even to a married daughter, beating the children, not cleaning the cooking vessels till all the black is gone, spreading the bed crooked, disobeying the in-laws, sleeping naked, applying oil, and so on. If it happens to be the last day of the dark fortnight on Thursday, a woman should not wash the mouth after meals, face south or west while eating, tie and dress hair in the evening, eat in a dark room, apply oil on the body after bath, be angry with or disobey the husband. Lakshmi does not leave the house of the woman who treats her husband as god, is of clean habits and shares her husband’s happiness and sorrow. Lakshmi shuns the house of the woman who is adulterous, lazy, dirty, quarrel some and disrespectful to the husband. The married woman has no future without her husband. If she does vainvrats leaving aside service to her husband, she is destined to be reborn as a child widow”.

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And what about the men then ? The story leaves a lovely message to men as well - respect the women because the supreme lord Jagannath also suffered as beggars by not respecting the lady of the house. You can build a house with all your money, but it will become Home only when the lady is there in charge.

From tomorrow we will have freedom - to bring and eat non-veg at home on all days except Monday / Thursday. We can eat on all days outside though. She was not even allowing to keep eggs at home - now we can keep them. So the restrictions eases from tomorrow and people can enjoy with all the non-veg items in parties. Someone who would have come up with these rituals, must had great knowledge of science from observations - the body can digest better in winter.