rajesh padmar, bengaluru

It is indeed a great step to educate people that the festival has been causing harm to ecology. It is to be realised that this is not the only festival that has been a bane to the ecology.

Take for instance any festival. It is mandatory to adorn the doors with mango leaves, as is the custom in South India Region, mainly. How many trees or the branches are shed for every fetival can only be a guess.

A fair assumption is that a family needs for every festival about 40 leaves and four branch-lets to adorn the door, and for Pooja decoration. It is fair to guess that to meet the needs of 3 to 4 thousand families who follow the customs of the festival, one tree has to be shed off of its leaves, totally.

Can we changing the customs to save these trees and for the sake of our future generations.

It is not the mango tree alone that is butchered. The Neem, Banana plants, Goosberry trees, ‘Shami’ trees, ‘Bilva Tree’, ‘Muttuga’ Tree, cocoanut trees, Ekka (Arka) plant, Tulasi Plant, and many other trees and plants are mercilessly hecked for observing the rituals.

Let us be sensible and think for a while to find if life is going to be bad due to curse by God for not observing the rituals, to protect the environment.

Certainly not and It is going to be whatever that happens to those who have no such rituals in their custom shall only happen to us also.

Can we do some damage control at least at this stage and teach our kids not to adopt to such customs in future?

Please help save our environment through supporting the nature to flourish than to perish

Om tat sat.
Ramu

It took about an hour for me to make the Ganesha (excluding decorations, which took about half an hour) and it came out pretty well. I later decorated it with stones and other decorative materials to make the crown, necklace, etc. We were very happy with the way the idol came out and I’ll probably do this every year from now onwards.

However some feedback on the video itself:
1. I would have preferred having the person explain some of the aspects of making Ganesha than to listen to the shlokas.
2. It also could have helped the person talk about proportions .. like leg should be x % larger than hands, trunk to be x times longer than hand, etc.
3. A kind of document or ppt with pictures at a few stages could have definitely helped. We could have printed this out and kept it next to us as, while making the idol, I obviously couldn’t be watching the video as (a) video is too quick and we are too new to this (b) we might not be making the idol where we have connectivity or where we can keep a laptop .. it does get a little messy.
4. It would be great if you could publish the locations where we could find the clay. I searched quite a bit before I found it.

Next time, I am very sure that my Ganesha will look much better than what it did this time, simply because I have expeirened it once.

A few observations from my experience:
1. The back cames out roundish, if you aren’t careful .. which doesn’t look great. Use a knife to cut and flatten the back, so that Ganesha will look more handsome. But do this before you place the legs, hands and trunk on the Ganesha.
2. If you are making the idol on the floor or the table, keep a thick plastic cover before you start, so you don’t mess the table/floor.
3. While making, place the Ganesha on a cardboard or a wooden board, after dusting it with some maida flour or talcom powder. Make a base first. Definitely helps. Make the mouse on the base.
4. When using water to dampen your hands and smoothen Ganesha, use very very little water .. just wet your fingers and shake the excess water. Else, the clay will get too slippery!
5. Once the idol is ready and before it dries, use a pencil or a pin to draw eyes and make some designs on the crown and platform.
6. Use a black beed for the eyes of both Ganesha and the mouse
7. Make the idol 3-4 days prior to the festival, so that it dries well. Once it dries well, you can take it out of the wooden or card board and place it in a plate.

Hope this helps someone who might want to try this next year.

Regards,
Sandhya.