Festival of Jallikattu in Tamil Nadu and Tamils are in ferment
It is one of the ironies of fate that a peaceful religion like Hinduism condones a festival that can lead to the death of a participant. This is JalliKattu or the taming of the bull, a festival in Tamil Nadu. The festival is as old as Tamil history and ancient Tamil tomes mention about this festival.
The festival is celebrated ever year during Pongal, the Tamil New Year and consists of a mass festival of taming the wild bull. It is a sport with bare hands and unlike in bull fighting,
no sword is used. The bull also is not killed but subdued and later used to mate with cows to produce a healthy breed. Bulls are specially reared for this purpose. It is, however, a dangerous sport and in many cases, the participants have been killed as they were gored by the bull.This year the Supreme Court has effectively banned the festival and the people are up in arms. It is hard to imagine that a simple ban on a festival celebration involving a bull has led to so much tumult. Obviously, something else is also the problem and this agitation against the ban on Jallikattu is a manifestation of general unhappiness of the people. Social scientists may like to study this aspect of
the psyche of the Tamil people. Even girls are supporting this sport and that is difficult to imagine unless it is thought of a macho sport.There is a mass movement in favor of this festival and the best part is that so far it is peaceful, but it requires only a matchstick and some unsocial elements to enter the crowds to convert it into a mob violence. The Government will have to guard against this as many girls are taking part in ths\is movement and as has happened earlier they become the targets soon.
The government must also decide what is wrong with the festival. Frankly, if a more terrible, bloody and dangerous sport can be played out in Spain I see no reason why a safer sport cannot be allowed in India. Bull fighting was earlier banned in Goa which was a hangover from Portuguese rule.
Taming and fighting bulls are a sport that has existed for centuries and the winners as a sign of macho power were given the best of virgins as a reward. Perhaps the girls also liked this as they had a concept of bravery associated with fighting bulls, which is not a sport for the faint heart.
