Hindu Culture and Covid-19

Covid-19 is spreading out loud currently world wide. It started in December 2019 and is still spreading across the globe. At this point, I notice a similarities between a lot of cultural relation between the social distancing norms established for the people to follow and the cultural practises in Hinduism.

1. Namaste as replacement of Shake hands
Namaste is a quite popular Indian way of greeting a person. This is not only in India, we can see this in many eastern cultures. Basically, we are not joing our hands or body parts with another person, but we are giving a great respect. Even today, saying a Namaste or Namaskar is standard form of greeting a person in a new day or during a meeting or any such occasion. NAmaste can be told to a person or can be used to greet a crowd as well. Now, due to Covid-19, our hands are tied and we are kind of stuck to use the Namaste greetings as replacements of a shake hand greeting.

2. Pula kuli as replacement of Quarantine
In India, if someone dies the closest relatives, blood relatives and siblings are usually considered impure for 14 days and they have to do a Quarantine for 14 days and on the 15th day they have to take part in a ceremony in which a priest would attend and do the cleansing of these people. The ceremony has some parts where people are sprinkled with Water from River Ganga which is considered the holiest river in India. On the 16th day, the people affected by the quarantine may go out in public and meet others. 

The Quarantine also has same number of 14 days to stay at home. Now only we know that the significant number of 14 days is the Gestation period for microorganisms like virus and bacteria.

3. Sanitising yourself after coming home as replacement of Washing pots in door step 
In Indian Homes, There used to be a water pot at the door stop. Usually made of brass and when some one comes home, they are supposed to wash their Hands and Legs before entering the home. This is a daily practice which the out going people do every day or atleast the serious guys. So there is a hit too.


4. Sanitising/Sterilisation as replacement of Shudhi kalasham in temples.
These days, if we find a place having an infected person or an object, we call a sanitation/ sterilisation company who can clean up the place and do a sterilisation to kill the viruses and bacteria. In Hindu culture, if there is an event of impurity, people would call a priest and do a cleansing procedure to clean up the place and make it free of impurities. 


The sad thing is that other than the Namaste, all habits have faded or altered for individual needs or certain community needs. Only the ritualistic practices are there but not much people follow it for the actual purpose. The so called purifying ceremony is just plain water and nothing else. Today we use alcohol and sanitisers to sanitise, we don't know what did our ancestors use. May be it was alcohol or may be it was not. Thanks to the Indian education system, which taught only the elite and the rich. However, The content may have faded but the rituals retained over the generations. Just because this was encoded as a practise of ritual in religion, we still have it, otherwise, it would have gone ages ago when foriegn invaders attacked Indian culture multiple time through out the History.

 

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