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Halloween Festival Images [5]
In the internet age, culture travels easily and the most exciting part of any culture is its festivals. While India itself is home to a multitude of its own festivals, the country has over the years adopted various festivals from the West – New Year’s Eve, and Valentine’s Day. these occasions have become commonplace across the country and are celebrated or acknowledged by much of the population in both urban and rural India. But, one festival that though popular in films and pop cultures, but has failed to capture the overall spirit of festivities in India is the festival of All Sants’ Day, better known as ‘Halloween’. Despite gaining popularity among urban youth in recent years, the phenomenon remains relegated to certain sections of urban partygoers and horror movie buffs.
In the West, All Saints’ Day is celebrated to honour the dead ancestors – it is believed that their souls come to visit, on this day. But the modern-day Halloween draws its roots from the Celtic festival of Samhain. It was a harvest festival to mark winter. Its origin dates back to a thousand years. It is said that on this day, spirits were believed to visit the Earth and people wore costumes and lit bonfires to ward off the ghost. In the 7th century, Pope Boniface IV designated May 13 as All Saints’ Day. But the occasion was moved to November 1, the date if Samhain, in the next century. Historians see it as an attempt by Christianity to appropriate the Pagan holiday of Samhain. November 1, thus became All Saints’/Souls Day, and October 31, the eve before that, became Halloween.
The entry of the festival into pop- culture, however, transformed it. Though started as a religious festival, Halloween today has become a largely secular holiday, enjoyed mostly by children and young adults in the west who dress up in costumes and go trick-or-treating. American shows and sitcoms exported the idea everywhere. Practices like carving spooky pumpkins, wearing absurd costumes, over-the-top makeup, horror-themed parties — transformed this festival into a capitalist extravaganza. But, in India, Halloween celebrations remain niche.
