Happy Holi !!

India a diverse country is home to a huge diversity of cultures, religions, and languages where people from different states and religions coexist harmoniously. The wide variety of festivals celebrated in India is a true manifestation of its rich culture and traditions. 

Holi is a festival that reminds us of a vibrant and colorful life which god has bestowed upon us. The colors with which Holi is celebrated denotes the various facets of life, moods, emotions, situations, attachments and aversions, spiritual knowledge, seasons, nature, evolution and involution of the universe, unity in diversity, one becoming many and many being one. All barriers like caste, creed, position, and language are forgotten and men and women join the fun, perfectly symbolizing unity in diversity.

The activities during festivals perturb the radiation balance of the atmosphere due to additional anthropogenic activities in different ways. Lately, in spite of all the fun and frolic, people have started taking into account the environmental impacts of Holi.

The wide spread burning of the holika leads to short-term air quality degradation events. The burning of fuel wood to create the bonfire for Holika Dahan presents a serious environmental problem. Trees / wood is a fast depleting resource and it is collected just to light the Holi fire for Holika Dahan.

A solution for this is the lighting of small symbolic fires using branches and twigs and waste material other than wood.

Collective celebrations of the Holika Dahan to reduce the burning of wood and also foster a better festive spirit.

The festival of 'Holi' is proving to be an environmental risk due to the toxic colors used during the celebrations. Unlimited and uncontrolled use of such dyes can lead to grave consequences in terms of human health and ecological balance.

Recent years have seen water shortage in urban and semi-urban areas due to the excessive growth in population. Holi has always been played with colors and over time wet colors have been in used in plenty. Splashing plain or colored water with large buckets on people around has also become a major source of entertainment. This again followed by a lot of water to get rid of the colors that have stuck on faces and bodies of the Holi players. Truly a major source of concern especially in such period of acute shortage and a worsening situation. 

Instead people could play with mud / geru , light colors of gulal and eco-friendly substances which would not harm the skin, nor require much water to wash them away. Quite a reduction it would be in the consumption of water even for a day. Plus it would create the added reduction in the use of chemical dyes

As inheritors of the planet the current generation needs to contribute towards this effort by doing as much as possible by way of implementing, propagating and educating, plans and schemes that would immediately address the issue of halting degradation to the environment in their respective neighbourhoods.

The joy of Holi knows no ends. In the case of Holi, each color has a specific meaning: green is for harmony, orange symbolizes faith in the future, blue brings health, yellow represents happiness while red represents love and joy. We must try to wash away all the evils in our hearts along with the colors and allow the color of love to stay there forever and ever. This is the true spirit of Holi.

Burn your ego, expectations, and everything negative in the fire of Holi and enjoy the festival. May God gift you all the colors of life, colors of joy, colors of happiness, colors of love and all other colors you want to paint your life with.

Happy Holi !!!