To keep children away from alcohol, milk & sugarcane juice was served during ‘Shimaga’ 

The process of transformation in the religious, social, economic, political, and cultural spheres tried to disrupt the stagnating traditional culture in Colonial India. The deliberate changes in social and religious attitudes and customs advocated by the reformers tried to safeguard cultural and religious ethos while trying to create a set of new rituals and customs appropriate for the newly emerging middle class.  

The reformation of the festival of “Shimaga” which was celebrated for five days with tremendous enthusiasm in the Bombay Presidency attracted a lot of attention from social and political leaders in Maharashtra. 

“Shimaga” was similar to Holi where a bonfire was lit, and men and children smeared each other with colours. In the nineteenth century, customs like abusing and consuming alcohol had infiltrated the celebrations and efforts were made to sanctify the festival consistent with the middle-class character of progressivism. 

On the morning of March 12, 1925, Vishnu Vaman Ketkar, a resident of Holkar Ali, Pune, was waiting for his guests. He had invited children and men to celebrate “Shimaga” with him. His wife had prepared an excellent spread of “laddoos”, “karanji”, and sweetened milk. There was sugarcane juice too. 

Ketkar was disturbed by the way the festival was celebrated. To burn the “Holi”, beds and doors were stolen for wood. Trees were cut in the middle of the night. Obscenities were hurled at each other. Men got drunk and harassed women. 

The previous year, he had invited children to his house after the festival and requested them not to be a part of the “abominable practices” associated with the festival. It was not religious to steal and get drunk, he had told them. 

To keep the children away from “temptation”, Ketkar invited them to his house that year where he had organised some games and snacks. A fund of ₹7 was collected, some of it coming from the children. Ketkar had managed to convince the Brahmin families to let him invite some non-Brahmin children and men from the “Hamalwada”. He had also invited a Temperance activist to speak to his guests. 

Like every year, bootleggers from villages around Pune had camped in the city a month before “Shimaga”. On April 19, 1925, the Marathi daily “Dnyanaprakash” reported that the sale of liquor during the week of the festival had earned the bootleggers enough profit to last for a year.  No wonder, every year, there were loud demands to ban the sale of liquor during the festival.   

The Marathi–English newspaper “Dnyanodaya” had called for the “intellectuals and elites” of Maharashtra to take steps to eradicate vulgarity in the celebrations. The Marathi newspaper “Induprakash” had suggested in 1886 that educated men from Mumbai and Pune should get together on “Shimaga” and discuss topics of importance over cups of tea and coffee. They were urged to set an example for “others” to follow. 

The “Holika Sudhar Samiti” was established in Mumbai and Pune in 1880 to bring reforms and act against the consumption of drinking and drunken brawls during “Shimaga”. 

To keep children away from alcohol, the idea of serving milk or sugarcane juice during the festival was put into practice by Seetaram Ganesh Deodhar, an associate of Gopal Ganesh Agarkar and the principal of the New English School, Satara. He started the “Shimaga Sammelan” at his school in the early 1900s. 

Initially, “native” games like kho-kho, swimming, and tug of war were organised for the boys. Later elocution and recitation competitions became a part of the event. Other schools in Satara and Pune soon started participating in the event. Donations were collected for snacks, milk, and sugarcane juice to be served during the two days of the competitions. 

At the Teachers’ Training College, a bonfire was lit. Students from Pune brought food for everybody from their homes. They recited poems and sang patriotic songs. They ate around the bonfire and spent the night in the college. The next day, there was a feast of “Puran Poli” for the students and their teachers. 

In the early 1930s, flag hoisting became a part of the celebrations. College students took out a procession in the city and assembled at the bungalow of Seth Amichand near the railway station. Speeches promoting temperance were given. Temperance was considered important for the Indian freedom movement. 

Around the same time, girls were included in the “Shimaga” competitions. Running and skipping competitions were organised for them. In 1936, at the Hujurpaga Girls School, Mr T Thombare, the minister of education, Bhor State, said that the festival of “Shimaga” excluded women and that such competitions were a good opportunity to preach them about health. 

For the nationalist reform movement in Maharashtra in the twentieth century, “female health” translated to “maternal health”. A healthy mother was important for “nation building” and “Shimaga” competitions were used to preach to the girls their duty to serve the nation by equipping themselves to keep their families healthy. They were advised to drink milk to make good mothers. 

In the early 1940s, rationing due to World War II and some objections about children spending a few days playing in the March heat while the annual exams approached made schools abandon the “Shimaga” competitions.   

But the clamour for the militarization of the Hindu youth made several sports clubs and gymnasiums, like the Hindu Seva Mandal in Kamathipura, join the movement for a “clean and pure” “Shimaga” in the 1930s. These institutions organized sports competitions for boys and men and preached drinking of milk instead of alcohol. 

While most individuals and organisations criticized the obscenity during the “Shimaga” celebrations, some like the “Aikyavardhak Mandal” in 1935 appealed to not celebrate the festival for environmental reasons. In a press release, it said that it was “inhuman” to burn wood when five crore farmers in India were starving. 

Such appeals met with derision and ridicule by most men. Dattatray Hari Bhat, an eminent lawyer and a member of the Health Board of the Poona Municipality, wrote in “Dnyanaprakash” in March 1926 that he knew many men who did not like the “obscene activities” associated with “Shimaga” but resorted to swearing, throwing garbage, and stealing wood out of the need to follow religious customs. 

Bhat had met Mr P Apte, the chairman of the Pune Municipality, the previous year, with a proposal to celebrate “Phalgunotsav”. It was meant to celebrate the arrival of the spring. People waited for the spring after enduring the rainy season and cold for eight months and when it arrived, they welcomed it with enthusiasm, Bhat noted. 

Apte had held a public meeting where people had voiced their grievances about the abuse, hooliganism, and arson during “Shimaga”. Street lamps were broken, garbage bins were overturned, and filth was thrown into their houses. 

“Phalgunotsav” was supposed to include “entertainment programs”. Bhat wanted the municipality to serve the attendees sugarcane juice and snacks. Parks and gardens were to be kept open throughout the day so that families could organize picnics and have dinner “surrounded by nature”. But this initiative never took off even though Apte had accepted the proposal. 

When nobody showed up at his house, Ketkar went out to see what was going on. His guests, children and men from the vicinity, were busy celebrating the festival by throwing dirt and ash at each other. He was told by the fathers and grandfathers of the children that it was the responsibility of the younger generation to continue the tradition laid down by their ancestors. For them, playing games and drinking milk and sugarcane juice during “Shimaga” meant subverting religion. 

They abused him. Seeing that their parents were in favour of celebrating the festival the “traditional” way, the children abused him too. 

Ketkar went home defeated. In a letter written to “Dnyanaprakash” on March 18, 1925, Ketkar narrated his ordeal. He expressed his disappointment but assured to keep trying till children and men celebrated “Shimaga” in a “sophisticated” manner. He promised that he would write to the newspaper once he was successful. 

I have not found that letter in the newspaper archives.