Pongal and Jallikattu
- January 13, 2021
- Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
- Category: DPN Topics
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Pongal and Jallikattu
Subject: Arts and Culture
Context: Tamil Nadu elections in 2021 has seen parties trying to make inroads by celebrating and being part of Tamil’s culture and heritage.
Concept:
- Pongal is the harvest festival of Tamil Nadu. It is a 4-day festival during the solar equinox after harvesting of crops like rice, sugarcane, turmeric, etc.
- The word ‘Pongal’ in Tamil literature means “boiling over”.
- The festival is a way of thanking nature god for the crops and everything else. It rejects old things and welcomes new things.
- People make traditional designs known as kolams in their homes with rice powder.
Jallikatu:
- It is a traditional bull-taming sport or ‘bio cultural sport’ seeking to promote native breed of organised in Tamil Nadu during Pongal.
- It is also known as Eruthazhuvuthal or Manjuvirattu.
- It is a sport in which bull (natively reared) is let loose among a crowd of people. The participants are supposed to take control of the bull by holding its hump for as long as they can.
- It is celebrated on the third day of Pongal also called “Mattu Pongal”. It is possibly a 2000-year-old tradition in Tamil society.
Controversy around Jallikatu
- In 2011 bull was added to the notification banning the training and exhibition of bears, monkeys, tigers, panthers and dogs and hence a ban on events like Jallikatu. Challenge to it was upheld by the Supreme Court.
- andJallikattu was banned by the Supreme Court in 2014, but the Tamil Nadu and central governments stepped in to reverse the bar amid widespread protests in the state.