Most festivals in India aren’t only ritual activities or celebrations but more about the notion of unity or peace and unity of people. At Rural Bengal one such incident during Ram Navami had touched people's hearts: A wage worker wanted to buy a huge saffron flag to hang it on his house and yet he didn’t have enough money. As he saw what he wanted, another Bengali Hindu brother offered the flag to him. This small act of kindness has come to become an emblem (and symbol) of community spirit and Hindu identity in West Bengal.
For many the saffron flag represents passion, dedication to hard work and cultural pride. The daily wage worker, little could have, but he wanted to honor Ram Navami by displaying and displaying the flag here at his house for his home. Even if he wasn't richly earning, the fact that festivals are a way of getting people like him to care even when he may struggle and give so much is inspiring. So many can struggle with time; the time to pay them back.
As another member of the community noticed his situation, he did not hesitate to alleviate it. By purchasing a saffron flag for the worker, he enabled the worker’s dream to take place. To me it was solidarity instead of money. It just means if something can’t be bought, others can help the people, in that tradition and faith and we are given to this one thing which doesn’t exist any longer.
Ram Navami is celebrated by people in India every time Lord Rama is born to their love. In West Bengal that is turning out to be the one day of Hindu unity. It’s only true that the same narrative can tell them how people come together and, too, we can take our faith and work in a common vision to help each other out with a smile. The saffron flag, we think, in this case was as much more than some piece of paper; it was a symbol of the sense of identity and solidarity.
Crowning this as a little common ground tells us it really does mean that all is in one mind.
- All festivals must be supported these days; we are better when everyone is involved.
- And if we go with others' beliefs to help people come through for their wishes, we help them form community bonds which support each other’s spirits.
- Symbols like the saffron flag only come to mean if they accompany each other like they’re in a state of compassion.
The daily wage worker who lives in Rural Bengal who wears the saffron flag tells us festivals are about more than rituals. They are about community; people in the same way are united. As Ram Navami grows and expands in West Bengal, such acts of compassion make Hindu unity on the face of the Earth.
