Nepal Celebrates Gaura Parva Festival with Great Fervor!

People of the far western part of Nepal are celebrating the Gaura Parva festival today with great devotion and pomp.

Celebrated in honor of Goddess Gauri, the wife of Lord Shiva, the festival attracts devotees from Province 5, Sudurpaschim Province, and Karnali Province.

According to the Nepali calendar, the festival, also called Durgaastami, falls in the month of Bhadra. It starts on Krishna Janmashtami (birth of Lord Krishna) and lasts for three days.

• On the first day of the festival (Panchami), the Nepali women collect a mixture of five seeds of crops called Biruda for worshipping Goddess Gauri.

• On the second day (Sasthi), the mixture is washed, and water is replaced amid prayers.
• On the third day (Saptami), the married women take a holy bath and offer their prayers to Gauri’s idol, made from paddy, sesamum, saun, balballu, and opamarga plants.

The women fast the whole day for the happiness and prosperity of their family members.

Besides this, the women and men celebrate the festival with deuda dance in which participants hold their hands and form a circle as they dance to traditional music.

However, the festival celebrations this year are restricted due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The Nepali Government has urged people to celebrate Gaura Parva by maintaining COVID-19 health safety protocols.

President Bidya Devi Bhandari extended her greetings on Gaura Parva to all the Nepalis and called for social distancing and celebrations at home.

“The festival would play a role in further augmenting mutual trust, goodwill, and emotional unity among the Nepalis from different caste, communities, and ethnicities with their specific cultures and festivities,” said President Bhandari.

NepaliSansar wishes all Nepalis at home and abroad on the occasion of Gaura Parva!