DEEPAWALI KRITYA (2019):

Offering of Deepaks during Deepawali: 

A few things suggested in our scriptures to be perform during the deepawali festival season are being shared with the readers.  If one has different tradition then one should follow that. Hope all will be able to follow this mix of tradition and scriptural details:

Date wise details as per Diwakar-Panchang being given below:

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Date          Tithi                Ends at    Other information
                                           (IST)

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12th Nov   Dwadashi        09.30 pm   Govats Dwadashi, Gandmool.
                                   
13th Nov   Trayodashi      05.59 pm   Yamdeep daan, Hanuman Jayanti, 

                                                            Maas Shivratri, 
                                                            Sompradosh-vrat, 

                                                            Dhan Trayodashi, 
                                                            Dhanwantri Jayanti. 

                                                            Hanuman Jayanti, 

                                                            Yam Tarpan.

                                                            
14th Nov    Chaturdashi   02.18 pm    Narak Chaudas, Deepawali Poojan

                                                            Pitra Karyeshu Amavas(after 2.18pm). 
                                    
15th Nov    Amavasya    05.16 pm    Kartik Amavasya(for bath etc.) , Kali poojan,
                                     (20th morn)   Luxmi/ Kuber Poojan, Annkoot,

                                                           Bath and Daan till 10.37 am.                                                                                                      Govardhan Pooja, Bali Pooja

                                                           

16th Nov   Prathma         07.07 am     Bhaidooj, Yam dwitiya, 

                                                            Poojan of pen and inkpot, 

                                                            Vishwakarma Poojan, 

                                                            Pen, Ink and books poojan.

XXXX      Dwitiya         XXXX      Tithi Kshaya (This day/ Tithi is not counted.)

17th Nov   Tritiya         01.18 am        Maas Prarambh (Month Start)

                                   (after midnight)
                                                         

During the month of Kartik, around Deepawali festival from Krishan Paksh (days of the waning moon) Trayodashi(13^th day as per Hindi calendar) to Shukla Paksh (nights of waxing moon) Dwitiya (2^nd day as per Hindi calendar), all five days Deepaks, (oil lamps, mostly made of earthen pottery or made of brass), are offered for various purposes. As per PADMPURAN, the details are as follows.

Kartik Krishan Paksh, Trayodashi. (falls on 13th Nov, 2020.)

As per scriptures, at the time of sunset offer a deepak outside the house for Yamraj, god of death for evading untimely death in life. Offering depak one should pray to him, "O Yama, son of the Sun, who has death and snares under his control and is accompanied by his wife, may you get happy by my offering of this deepak on this 13^th night of Kartik Krishan paksh."

Offer a deepak at the door with following mantra:

Mritunaam Pashdandabhyam, Kalen Ch Maya sah,

Trayodashyaam Deep Danat Suryajah Priyataamiti.

Traditionally, some people in villages use four-faced deepak on this day. They light it by the side water drains etc from their houses. In fact, it is done in the South direction. The problem arises when the main gate of the house is not in south direction. So one can say South Direction is more important than the direction of the main gate in the house. Also use a smaller depth Deepak if using four-faced one. else it will extinguish easily.

Dhanteras is also celebrated today.As per tradition, on the day of Dhanteras, earthen statues of Ganapati and Luxmi are bought. This day lord Dhanwantri appeared with a kalash in his hands during sagar manthan(Ocean churning). Since he carried a Kalash with him so tradition of buying utensils on this day became prevalent.

Kartik Krishan Paksh, Chaturdashi (falls on 14th Nov, 2020)

As per scriptures, on this day Devi Luxmi resides in oil and river Ganges, in water.

All who fear hell should take early morning bath (traditionally after massaging one -self with black Sesame oil) and take a lauki /gheea, (table gourd), and rotate it three times over one's head saying, "I rotate you around my head time and again, please take away all my sins."  Table gourd is touched to the forehead and offered in alms or in a temple.Then one should do tarpan of Yamaraj with water with the following names:

Yamaya namah¹, Dharmrajaye Namah², Mrityave Namah³, Antkaaye Namah⁴, Vaivastaye Namah⁵, Kalaye Namah⁶, Sarvbhootkshayaye Namah⁷, Dadhanaye Namah, Audumbaraye Namah⁹, Neelaye Namah¹⁰, Parmeshthine Namah¹¹, Vrikodaraye Namah¹², Chitraye Namah¹³, Chitraguptaye Namah¹⁴.

Since Yama is a god, so Tarpan should be done from the Dev Teerth part of the hand i.e. finger tips. After this at night offer Deepaks at different places, like on the walls of the house, at the place where four roads meet, near unpaved pathways where people walk (jungle paths), in the temples, by the side of roads, in gardens, below Dev Vriksha (trees), an uneven place, where there are thorns and mosquitoes, or in the place where horses or elephants are tied at night.  Generally a four faced deepak is offered by villagers at the cross roads.    

Offer two deepaks at the gate of one's house; one for Yama and other for two dogs, (black and black & white), of Yamaraj with dripping clothes with the following mantra.

Shunkau Shyamshablao, Bhratrau Yam Sevakau,

Tushtau Syataam Chaturdashyaam, Deep danen Mritujau.

On this day in villages people offered 25 deepaks; 05 to Pitra, 05 to Sati devis, 05 to Lord Vishnu, 05 to Gram devta or Kheda and 05 for Mata/Luxmi/Durga etc.

Amavasya night (15th Nov. 2020, Deepawali):

As per Varah Puran, the Tanmatras came from the heart of Lord Brahma. They shone brightly and asked the devtas that we want to drink SOMRAS and desired to go to higher realms. They thought we will establish our asan in the space above.  Thus they raised their faces up and started to move upwards in a slanted pathway. Then Brahma told them to become PITRAS for all the family people. Since they had their faces upturned hence they were called NANDIMUKH. They were given the Dakshinayan time of the Southward moving Sun. When they asked 'what will be given to us', then AMAVASYA tithi was reserved for them. Whosoever will do tarpan with water, black sesame seeds, and kusha will reach the Pitras and they will feel satisfied by it. Whosoever will do tarpan of the Pitras on this day, it is the duty of the Pitras to give them some VAR (boon, gift) in return.

Take an early morning bath and with great devotion perform poojan of devtas and tarpan of pitras. Perform Parvan Shradh. Offer food to Brahmins.  

Further as per traditions in villages, two sets of two lotas/utensils, placed one over other, filled with water were used in poojan. The water of one set was offered to pitras and other set water was offered to satis, after bath. A bhog of kheel and batasha is offered to both.

For Ratri poojan of Luxmi:

On this night for poojan of Luxmi a silver statue or a silver coin is used.

A red cloth is spread out with rose petals sprinkled over it. Luxmi ji is bathed in milk, ghee, honey, curd, sugar each, followed by Ganga jal. All her Sringaar is done as per ones own imagination, devi poojan is done with dhoop, deep, naivedya, flower, flower garland, itra, bell after offering asan,  chatra etc. Put ghee deepk on her right side and sesame seed oil deepak on left side. Do not use rice in poojan but kheel of dhaan instead may be used. Wash Her mouth, hands and feet and offer food to her etc. Offer kheer, wash mouth hands etc. Offer a paan  with supari, laung, elaichi and panch meva may also be offered.     

One can use 16 things as enumerated below in Her poojan, establishing a kalash which should contain water upto 1.25 litres. Put  coconut on top of it wrapped in red cloth. Put leaves of mango, Pakad, Baniyan tree(badh)etc with copper coin in water and may errect two stambhs of banana leaves. If possible may draw a yantra and do panch upchaar poojan of it before puting a kalash on it. This requires a little practice and knowledge as per scriptures. In our villages, elders just kept a water pot established for a few days without other details. Hence, it is your personal convenience, though poojan can be done in silver coin even.

1 Asan, 2 Argha-Padya-Panchamrit snan, 3 Scent, 4 Vastra-upvastra, 5 Sringaar, 6 Flowers , 7 Bilvatra, 8 Dhoop, 9 Deep, 10 Naivedya,11Tambool, 12 Pungiphal, 13 Dakshina, 14 Neeranjanam, 15 Pushpanjali, 16 Pradakshina-Kshamapan-Visarjan. These are the 16 items for Shodash upchaar poojan, although panchopchar poojan with five things can also be performed if unable to do Shodashopchar. They are 1 Asan, 2 Argha, 3 Dhoop, 4 Deep, 5 Pushp-Pushpmala.

Also offer two Kamal/lotuses in the poojan on this day.

After doing all the poojan, whole night perform luxmi beej mantra jap. One can use any of the following mantra on kamalgatta mala,

Om Shreem Namah. 

Om Aim Hreem Shreem Shri Mahalaxmaye namah. 

Om Shreem Hreem Shreem Kamle Kamlalye praseed praseed Om Shreem Hreem Shreem Mahalaxmayee namah swaha.

Then at midnight, one can perform havan with above mantra attaching swaha at the end (if not there) with ahuti of Bilv-patra and Kamalgatta seed equivalent to 10% of the jap done. Then perform tarpan equivalent to 10% of havan and marjan equivalent of 10% of tarpan. Bhojan offering to brahmins of kumaris can be done as 10% of marjan. But even if one kumari poojan and offering is done with complete shradha it is equivalent to offering the whole earth.  If one does like this on this day, Luxmi ji resides in one's house for complete year and showers everything over the devotee. 

At midnight ladies of the house should guide Aluxmi (poverty) out of the house by making sounds while hitting on a soop (used to clean grains in olden times). Thus they should roam around in whole of the house and then come out through front door and thus guide Aluxmi out of the house. In some parts of Uttarpradesh in India, they burn big bundle of hay and move through the whole of the house calling, "alai balai jaat", (the evil things al and bala to leave their dwelling). Then they move out of their house with that burning bundle and leave it at a place outside the village. This must be guiding those bad spirits to a place outside the village. In some villages, this is done by house-wive's early in the morning. They gather all the dust and dirt of the house, put it on a platter with a deepak and take it through all the rooms of the dwelling chant 'Bhag dridra, Ishwar aya'. Saying thus, they take that dirt platter out of the house. Many people these days use a platter for carrying deepak and then keep on striking it to make sound. As per shastra Soop is required, which was converted to handheld fans which were made of same material as soop earlier and now, for convenience, it has been further modified to plates or something.

 At Brahm Muhurt, (the 2 hour time span before Sunrise), ladies should wake up Sri Luxmi first and then perform her poojan, (thus she stays in the same place for a long time) and afterwards wake up Janardan for his poojan. 

As per Bhavishya Puran, Lord Vishnu got pleased with King Bali and gave Kartik Amavasya to him. On this day poojan of King Bali is also done. A sleeping cot is taken and white tanduls are tied with it, avahan of Bali is done in it and his poojan is performed in it. Offerings in the name of Bali are given as daan. Whatever is offered like this becomes eternal.

This tithi is for removal of all kinds of upheavels, obstructions and anguishes. This is called Kaumudi as it gives happiness to all on Earth. KU means Earth and MUDI means happiness. Traditionally in villages 11 deepaks were offered on this night.

Shukla Paksh Patipada, Kshaya is there hence all the things to be done on this day must be completed on the previous day only in the morning.

One should perform poojan of Govardhan at home. For this, people in the villages make a small mountain of cow's dung and consider it to be Govardhan mountain and keep books, writing material of children by its side and perform poojan of Govardhan and knowledge. in the form of pens, books and ink pots. One also does poojan of cows and buffaloes.

Kartik Shukla Paksha, Prathama (16th Nov,2020) :

(because Dwitiya is Kshaya and not counted this year as per Panchang)

It is also called Yam-Dwitiya. Perform poojan of Yamaraj, offer gifts to one's sister, should not eat at ones own place but at ones sisters place. Thus one will never face any kind of dispute the whole year.

Perform tarpan of Devtas with rice & water, Rishis with barley & water and Pitras with black sesame seeds & water.

It is also said that during the Kartik month Ekadashi, when the Sun is there in Tula Rashi or Poornima one should offer deep to lord Vishnu.

Namah Pitribhyah Pretebhyo, Namo Dharmaay Vishnave,

Namo yamay Rudraya, Kantarpatye Namah

If, with the above mantra ancestors are offered a deepak in space or akaash, then all the ancestors who are stuck in hell are elevated to a higher realms.

For Pitra tarpan etc. if one can use silver metal utensils it will be very beneficial.

One who offers a deepak of sesame seed oil or ghee the whole of the Kartik month, he gets the fruit of an Ashwamedh yajna.

One who offers a deepak to Lord Vishnu during this month gets the fruit of doing all kinds of yajna and of having taken a dip in all the teerthas.

If during the above five days an oil or ghee Deepak is offered to the ancestors then all the ancestors get mukt (salvation).

Trust all the above information is interesting and can be used this time around Deepawali by all for self and for the benefit of ancestors. This article has been repeated with a few modifications from the previous one. Further, all are requested to inform anything special done in their tradition during these poojas to enable upgrade and make the article more informative for all the readers............ Om! Shaktanand