i need a information about basant festival in which i need information about death rate during basant and other stuff.

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There are also references to “man-carrying kites” as early as the 4c ce, though my source I think overinterprets a reference “returning blades” to helicopter-like mechanics instead of a flapping motion which seems more likely.

Raana Khan

Chicago

Chhap tilak sab chhinni re mose naina mila ke . . .

The words soaring upwards carried us into the sky. A brief visit to the windswept blue, circling with the buzzards, beyond the shallow domes rising over the huge bulk of the Jama’at Khana. A brief visit before we were brought back by the jostling of the crowd to the marble filigree screen she was tightly clutching with one hand. The screen around the mazaar of Hazrat Amir Khusrau Dehalvi; courtier to seven sultans, revered sufi and companion of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya, foremost poet and virtual inventor of Hindavi ; dead for nearly seven hundred years. A screen beyond which women were not permitted.

Not surprising, considering the song was all about, in rather erotic metaphors, Khusrau’s love for his guru Nizamuddin Auliya. If Khusrau forgot himself and found himself nearly drowned in a dyer’s vat on looking into the eyes of Nizamuddin, he really didn’t need, or want, women around.

Bal bal jaaon main tohre rangrejuaÖ

All around us, the dyerís vat was much in evidence. Turbans, kerchiefs, dupattas in the hundreds freshly dyed in spring yellow, the colour of sarson fields stretching to the horizon when seen from a swiftly passing car on an open highway. Weíd forgotten that it was Basant Panchami, and had never known that it was celebrated at Nizamuddin, so were in a beatific daze.

One of the tall hatted, ledger bearing sajjadanashin, who can zero in on a bewildered expression (and relatively prosperous clothing) faster than a hovering chil spots playground lunchbox contents, swooped down upon us with the story.

Nizamuddin was once so grieved because of the passing away of his young nephew, that he withdrew himself completely from the world for a couple of months. Either he would lock himself inside a room, or when no one else was around to disturb his sorrow, he would sit by his nephewís grave. Khusrau, who could not bear with his absence any longer, started thinking of ways to brighten him up.

One day Khusrau met a few women on the road who were dressed up beautifully, singing and carrying colourful flowers. He asked them what they were up to. The women told him it was Basant Panchami, and they were taking the offering of Basant to their god. And of course, on Basant Panchami, the offerings are/were made to Kama, the god of love. Khusrau found this very fascinating, and smiling he said, “Well, my god needs an offering of Basant too.√Æ

Immediately, he dressed himself up like those women, took some mustard flowers and singing the same songs, started walking towards the graveyard where his pir would be sitting alone. Nizamuddin Aulia noticed some women coming towards him Рhe could not recognize Khusrau. And then, presumably as Nizamuddin was about to bawl them out for disturbing his reverie, he recognised Amir Khusrau, courtier to Sultans and his greatest fan, dressed in ghagra choli and carrying a basket of bright yellow mustard, he cracked upÖ

Main to piya se naina lada aayi reÖ

- Yaar, said Angel with a tone of total awe, as tallhat went over to more amenable prey since Angel and I both pleaded broke-ness, Cross-dressing also? Khusrau to saccha lover tha! You should learn something from him!
We walked towards the mazaar of Nizamuddin Auliya where the qawwals were singing, and I had to keep brushing away the ittar waalas from my ears, behind which they insisted on sticking cotton swabs soaked in cheap reeking chemical ittar…

Well the news is they dont. Not only that many Pakistanis often hold out on the quaint memories(probably transferred by those of the elder generation) that Indian culture or even Indian Punjabi (or the Delhi and surrounding areas)is the same as in the 1940ties. Not only is culture dynamic but also with the formation of different states different states have taken slightly different paths. While it is true that Basant as described in this is a important part of Punjabi culture and to some extent in UP elsewhere it is a different story.

Also not the link given for Indian Celebrations of Basant. If Sahiytya Academy is involved in anything you can be rest assured that it is a dying if not an already dead tradition.