Why I named my son Vasisht..

Vasisht, as per mythology, was a sage considered as Maha Guru (Master), a master for all the humble who are ready to accept divine knowledge and who are true to their motives and intentions. In fact, the epic Ramayana identifies sage vasishta as the mentor of Rama and Laxmana. One of his greatest philosophical statement was that the habit of laziness is a disease that is responsible to bring unhappiness in a man`s life.

Around India, we could find a lot of temples with embodiment of the great mythological characters that have lived through the golden epics of Ramayana and Mahabharatha. But there is only one temple in India , which has the deity as the embodiment of the divine potential of sage Vasishta.  This temple located in Arrattupuzha, kerala and is dated back 3000 years old. There is a very popular temple festival called Arattupuzha Pooram, associated with the temple,  and as per tradition it is believed to be a conglomeration of gods where in Deities from the neighborhood shrines appear on caparisoned elephants lined up in a row. Their staging resulted in a spectacular show along with the fireworks. The tradition puts it that the deities appear together to commemorate sage Vasishta, as respect to the most privileged master and has been a part of the temple activities  since its formation.

I come from arrattupuzha. I have wondered on the effort taken by the villagers to ensure that this age old tradition is maintained for all the 3000 years the event is celebrated. Irrespective of the religion, the event has also become a source of living for many in form of festival lighting in the area, drama competitions that has become a part of this festival, small scale industrial units, caparisoning the elephants and the embroidery work associated and much more. One could feel the immense respect of human beings to each other to celebrate a festival , which neither has any historical importance like the victory day in France or geographical importance like a formation day of a nation. It is just a village event nothing more and it is the group of villagers’ responsibility to make it successful.

I named my son Vasisht, as a commemoration to all the people who had contributed to the success of this traditional event that was effervescent and resplendent during the 3000 years of its history.