The village located under Pusa block in Samastipur district is now busy making preparations for January 22 event when they plan to celebrate both “Diwali” and “Dawat” (feast).It is believed Ram, while leading his wedding procession, had stayed at this village on the way to Janakpur due to which the village got its name, old timers say but they don’t have any documentary proof to prove their contention. The only record they hold is the 1896-97 Revenue Survey which mentions the village’s name as “Srirampur Ayodhya”—now a home to some 300 houses from various castes.
“It is a rare honour and pleasure to be a resident of Ayodhya (in Bihar) and very obviously we all are exultant and euphoric. It will be both Diwali and Dawat on that day,” a village resident Nawal Kishore Choudhary told the TOI on Tuesday. Choudhary who recently retired as an agronomy department professor with Dr Rajendra Prasad Central Agriculture University, Pusa said they would be organizing various religious programmes on January 22 such as recital of Sundarkand and Hanuman Chalisa, offering special prayers to the deities and decorating their homes with twinkling earthen lamps to celebrate the occasion. According to him, “Ram Vivah” has been the main festival of their village for a long time.
“This Diwali (on January 22) will be special and several times more spectacular than the one we celebrated in November. We are urging every houseowner to use only earthen lamps to decorate their homes and not the electric bulbs,” another villager Sanjeev Ranjan Choudhary, a farmer, said.
“Waise to is function ko lekar pura Hindustan khush hai lekin hamare jaiswa Diwali kahin aur dekhne ko nahin milega
(Although the whole of India is delighted about this function but the Diwali like ours will not be seen anywhere else),” he claimed.
Vimal Kumar Singh, another villager, says he has planned to give a feast to the villagers to celebrate the occasion. “I am planning to organise a
bhandara
since January 22 is a big event,” Singh who earlier worked with a private company said. He informed all the villages located under 13 panchayats of Pusa block have been invited for the function and some Muslims villagers too have consented to grace this occasion. “This will be a special Diwali worth watching,” he claimed.
Samatipur, some 85 KM from Patna, had earlier hogged limelight when RJD chief Lalu Prasad, then chief minister of Bihar, had on October 23, 1990 arrested BJP leader LK Advani who started Rath Yatra to support the construction of a temple at Ayodhya. The arrest followed after Advani refused to pay heed to Lalu’s appeal to postpone his yatra and return to Delhi.
“I appeal to Advaniji to postpone his yatra and return to Delhi in national interest. Who will ring the bell in temples and offer namaz in mosques when there are no humans left? I can quit the throne but won’t allow communal frenzy to grip the state,” was how Lalu had said in his electrifying speech at Gandhi Maidan before ordering for the arrest of Ayodhya-bound Advani who had declared, “
Mandir wahin banayenge.
”