Marking the seventh day of the ongoing 10-day-long Dashain festival in Nepal, the Phulpati ceremony is observed today. Dashain is the biggest festival in Nepal where there are family gatherings and people celebrate it with tradition and great fervour, on the occasion of phulpati, people offer sacrifices in temples and bring assorted holy leaves and flowers inside their homes. Here’s More from our correspondent from Kathmandu-
Phulpati is an assortment of sugarcane, turmeric, ginger saplings, belpatra, delicacies, flowers and fruits that are anointed and taken inside the home and shakti temples on banana leaves as part of the celebration. Common man as well as the State celebrates Phulpati with great fervour.
In a Phulpati badhai ceremony organised by the State at Tundikhel in Kathmandu, President Ramchandra Paudel, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Nepali Army, was the Chief Guest. The Phulpati Badhai is a unique celebration practised by the Nepal Army in continuity to religion, culture, and tradition.
A palanquin containing barley shoots called Jamara and Phulpati is brought from Gorkha into Hanumandhoka Durbar in Kathmandu with an Army parade, panchebaja band and Army music band. Gorkha is 166 Km away from Kathmandu, and it has been a unique tradition from the time of the King of Gorkha Prithvi Narayan Shah to bring Phulpati to Hanumandhoka, which continues to date.
By Sweta Singh (Kathmandu)