Agency tribes celebrate Chikkudukayala Panduga

KAKINADA: The tribes in Chinturu area have celebrated the Chikkudu Kayala Panduga, a festival of cluster beans, on Monday.

The tribal farmers and the people of the agency area offer the first harvested crop to the local gods and goddess and this is a tradition to them. According to them, the village elders decide when the festival will be celebrated after assessing whether the crop is ready for harvest or not. They invite their relatives residing in other areas for the events.

The people of Chinarkuru village in Chinturu mandal celebrated the festival. As per the tradition, they knocked and touched every house with sticks, in the village, with the aim of driving away evil spirits and invite good spirits to them, their family members, relatives and also to the village people.
They offer “meals” including ‘beans” curry and “starch” as Nivedyam to the God or Goddess in their village. They do this after performing special poojas to the village god on the outskirts.

At night, they performed special poojas to their gods and goddesses of their houses by breaking coconuts, offering Nivedyam and providing food to their relatives.

“The men in our families enjoy a lot by consuming ``toddy’’ while the women are offered different dishes. From the next day of the festival, we will eat beans curry etc and then sell the crop in the market,’’ said Kunja Anil of Chinarkuru village.

In all the tribal villages, the tribes would perform festivals to please each vegetable, after harvesting the crop. “During Karthika Masa, we celebrated the Pacha Panduga (Greenery festival), after harvesting bitter gourd and other vegetables. We will not consume such vegetables without celebrating the festival and without offering those to the god or goddess or sell the crop to others,” he said.

According to tribes, after watching their tradition, non-tribe families residing in the respective villages celebrate the vegetable festival. It is their tradition and custom for years together and they will follow this without deviation.

Pandit Ch Subrahmanya Sastry said Chikkudu Kayalu (beans) and Regi Pandu (jujube) and others are shown as a mark of sanctity. Many Hindu families, in particular the brahmins, will not start consumption of cluster beans and Jujube till the Ratha Sapthami festival in the auspicious Telugu month Magha Masa. The people make chariots with the leaves of clustered beans and perform poojas. On the day, the people will take a bath by keeping Jilledu leaves and Jujube on their heads and then take a bath.

After that, the people will consume clustered beans and jujube. But, he said, nowadays, many people gave up such a practice. He said he would be proud that the tribes are following such a sacred tradition.