Thousands of people, mostly family and relatives of the villagers, are expected to reach Kalpathy and adjoining villages during the festival
Thousands of people, mostly family and relatives of the villagers, are expected to reach Kalpathy and adjoining villages during the festival
The villages of Old Kalpathy, New Kalpathy, and Chathapuram are bracing up to herald the annual car fest in a big way. The district administration, at a meeting held with the organisers of the Kalpathy Rathotsavam on Friday, offered full cooperation for the incident-free conduct of the festival from November 7 to 17.
Thousands of people, mostly family and relatives of the villagers, are expected to reach Kalpathy and adjoining villages during the festival. The flag for the Rathotsavam will be hoisted on November 8 morning. The tradition has it that the residents should not leave the villages during the festival.
“For ages, we have been following this tradition. Once the festival flag is hoisted, we do not leave the village until the flag is lowered. So the days between November 8 and 17 are propitious to the people living in the villages,” said K.N. Lakshminarayanan, one of the patrons of the festival organising committee.
The major temples of Kalpathy and its neighbourhoods are being cleaned up and decorated ahead of the festival. The large wooden chariots, in which the main deities will be taken to the villages on the last three days of the festival, are also being cleaned up and repaired.
The chariots in different sizes according to the stature of the deity will be the biggest attraction of the festival. Sree Visalakshi Sametha Viswanatha Swamy Temple, the centre point of the car fest, has three chariots: that of Siva, Ganapathy and Murugan. Siva has the biggest and oldest chariot. Built in 1996, the 50-tonne chariot of Siva has six wheels. When the main four wheels are made of metal, the two inner wheels are wooden. Made by Chinnarajan from Perambalur in Tamil Nadu, Siva’s chariot takes pride in its size and weight.
“When fitted with stanchions and decorated with flowers made of paper pulp, it will reach a height of 40 feet,” said V. Natarajan, the lead carpenter in charge of the chariots’ maintenance.
Ganapathy has a 40-tonne chariot with its four wooden wheels encased in metal. Made in 2012 by Chinnarajan’s son Manikandan, this chariot can touch 35 feet when adorned with stanchions and flowers. “The introduction of metal encasement for the giant wooden wheels as suggested by an engineer of Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd., Tiruchirappalli, was a great move. It saved a lot of damage and efforts,” said Mr. Lakshminarayanan.
The smallest of the three chariots of the main temple belongs to Murugan. Built in 2006 by Mr. Natarajan and team, the 1.5-tonne chariot has four wooden wheels. “We are planning to get all these chariots spruced up by the first week of November,” said Mr. Natarajan.
He said they had already started working on making stanchions and other decorative items using Indian kino lumber (Venga tree in Malayalam). “Indian kino is preferred to other timber in the making of the chariot because of its flexibility and ease to work with,” said Mr. Lakshminarayanan. Apart from the Indian kino, chadachi or Dhaman wood is also used in the repairs and decorations.
