The festival of colours is back, and is immersing people with much needed joy and enthusiasm.
As revelers tumble out on the streets with gulal and colour-filled pichkaris, and fragrance of delicious sweets, especially gujiyas, fill our homes and hearts, its time to welcome the beautiful spring season and spread the message of love and brotherhood.
Holi has various legends associated with it. The foremost is the legend of demon King Hiranyakashyap who demanded everybody in his kingdom to worship him but his pious son, Prahlad became a devotee of Lord Vishnu.
Hiranyakashyap wanted his son to be killed. He asked his sister Holika to enter a blazing fire with Prahlad in her lap, as Holika had a boon which made her immune to fire. Story goes that Prahlad was saved by Lord himself for his extreme devotion and evil minded Holika was burnt to ashes, for her boon worked only when she entered the fire alone.
Since that time, people light a bonfire, called Holika on the eve of Holi festival and celebrate the victory of good over evil and also the triumph of devotion to God.
Although Holi is celebrated in every part of India and many regions across the world in their own traditional ways, with different legends attached to them, the message is one: to keep aside grievances and embrace the joys of life.
Rediff.com presents a bunch of colourful images from across the world, and wishes each one of you a very HAPPY HOLI!!
In this picture, students, with their faces smeared in gulal, celebrate Holi, at a college in the Chandigarh.
As revelers tumble out on the streets with gulal and colour-filled pichkaris, and fragrance of delicious sweets, especially gujiyas, fill our homes and hearts, its time to welcome the beautiful spring season and spread the message of love and brotherhood.
Holi has various legends associated with it. The foremost is the legend of demon King Hiranyakashyap who demanded everybody in his kingdom to worship him but his pious son, Prahlad became a devotee of Lord Vishnu.
Hiranyakashyap wanted his son to be killed. He asked his sister Holika to enter a blazing fire with Prahlad in her lap, as Holika had a boon which made her immune to fire. Story goes that Prahlad was saved by Lord himself for his extreme devotion and evil minded Holika was burnt to ashes, for her boon worked only when she entered the fire alone.
Since that time, people light a bonfire, called Holika on the eve of Holi festival and celebrate the victory of good over evil and also the triumph of devotion to God.
Although Holi is celebrated in every part of India and many regions across the world in their own traditional ways, with different legends attached to them, the message is one: to keep aside grievances and embrace the joys of life.
Rediff.com presents a bunch of colourful images from across the world, and wishes each one of you a very HAPPY HOLI!!
In this picture, students, with their faces smeared in gulal, celebrate Holi, at a college in the Chandigarh.
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