The landscape of some urban areas of India still carves out a niche inhabited by people ignorant of celebrations of Christmas. Recently a young lady from the locality “Dhaniram ka Purwa”, an area in Faizabad district of UP was puzzled on being asked about her forthcoming plans on Christmas. The question was like an alien element for her. This is not an epilogue to such incidences rather a mourning episode extracted from a common series. When the urban gets painted in red and white weeks before the actual festival, some parts of country still float among the grey clouds of complete ignorance about such celebrations.
Christmas for certain people embarks a beaded string of festival celebration while for some it just remains a gazette holiday in the Indian calendar. For some, Christmas embodies the fantasy of a big fat man dressed in red attire bringing goodies whilst for others it is another day full of struggle against the icy winds.
India is a land which is not only divided on cultural ground but surmounted by petty issues like ability to wear a red attire on Christmas and struggle for a piece of cloth on body. On one bay we see abodes with beautifully decorated Christmas trees in a magnificent combination of them with colorful lanterns. The other bay reflects a complete opposite picture where some poor souls are entangled in the web threaded by strings depicting troubles of life in managing fire in the house somehow.
In the Indian continent, this single festival in the month of December extends its geographical boundaries of celebrations of Christmas from rich people to people from other castes too. The scenario takes a reverse gear if one analyses the picture of this Asian continent from the telescope of a person inhabiting the interior region. The word is like a new addition to their regular dictionary.
The celebration of Christmas in India is a term synonymous to change. It emblazes an amphibian characteristic with some cities engrossed in painting the tinsel town in red and other completely ignorant to such happenings around the corner. For some it’s a day called Christmas and for others it is still a 'Bada Din' with a response similar to its antonym.
Alas but true, Christmas is turning into a festival of rich bellies from which the aura of sacrifice by Christ is getting evaporated. In order to prevent such a mis-happening, a strong call needs to be addressed by the cream of Indian society to strengthen the essence of Christmas and make the joy of festival infectious for every strata of the society.
A pledge is needed by every citizen to extend the circumference of episodic celebrations to those sections of society too where joy has failed to penetrate till date. The festival deserves celebrations not only from the golden corner but a heavy downpour from the important knots of society embedded deep in the stucco of some archeological excavations. This Christmas must bring a change in our society and deliver joy to each abode irrespective of the financial outline of its resident. May this Christmas configure a silver lining in the grey cloud reverberating amidst the weaker segment of society.