Women bid adieu to Bathukammas

The Bathukamma festival was celebrated in the district with great pomp and fanfare by the people here on Saturday.

Devotees went ecstatic on listening to the songs of Bathukamma. Women divided themselves into four groups and took part in the Bathukamma celebrations at various important junctions. The festival concluded on Saturday.

The people recalled the mythological stories associated with Bathukammma. They believe that Goddess Gowri is Bathukamma who brings happiness and prosperity in their lives. She symbolizes Mother Nature.

A sea of humanity was witnessed at the Komati Cheruvu in the town where women took out a huge procession carrying the idols of Bathukamma on their heads to immerse the idols in the lake on the concluding day.

Bathukamma festival concludes

Warangal: Thousands of women and girls in their best traditional attire walked to the banks of various tanks to bid farewell to Goddess Gauri Devi placed in their bedecked Bathukammas in Warangal on Saturday.

In a grand finale to the nine-day festival called Saddula Bathukamma on last day, women carried the colourful Bathukammas in a semi conical shape with arrangements of flowers of all hues. Placing them in the centre, women formed circular formations and sung rhythmic traditional songs in chorus moving in clockwise direction, which are traditional to the Bathukamma festival, and most popular among the songs at the venue, ‘Bathukamma…Bathukamma.. Uyyalo’.

Women offered prayers to Goddess Gauri Devi for best family life and good future. After the prayers, they placed Bathukammas into water in the water bodies.

Women here also thronged the nearest venues for celebrations, which included Ranglila Maidan, Chinna Waddepalli, Bandam Cheruvu and others in the tri-cities of Hanamkonda-Warangal-Kazipet.

The festival is like a reunion of old friends or meeting their relatives as the women prefer to celebrate this particular festival at their mother’s place. Warangal is a major Telangana city where this festival is celebrated with religious fervor.

At the end of the festival women, who also bring prasadams made from fresh ingredients offered as Vaayanams, a kind of exchange among the devotees.

Greater Warangal Municipal Corporation officials, police and district administration made elaborate arrangements for smooth conduct of festival.