Rathas In An Open Air Museum Without Being Dismantled

Can the Rathas (chariots )of Mahaprabhu Shree Jagannath be stored and displayed in an open air museum?

It is a matter of great regret that all the three chariots of Mahaprabhu Jagannath,Balavadra and Devi Subhadra are dismantled after the completion of the Rath Yatra. All those wooden body parts of the Rathas are burnt in the grand kitchen of the temple and subsequently some other parts are auctioned by the Shree Jagannath temple administration office at Puri.

There are different specific details of each of those RATHAS like number of wheels, total number of wood pieces used,height, length & breadth, colour of canopies, charioteer,flag name,name/colour of horses, accompanying deity,  parshwa devatas( subsidiary deities) etc..But unfortunately these never come to the notice of a wider audience coming to Puri during other time of the year not coinciding with the Rath Yatra . Let me give a brief outline of Rath Yatra.

Mahaprabhu Jagannath’s world-famous Rath Yatra or Srigundicha Yatra begins every year on Ashadh Shukla Dwitiya Tithi ( as per lunar calendar) . The duration of this journey is actually twelve days. From the 2nd of Ashada Shukla to the 13th of Ashada Shukla (Niladrivije).

A museum is an institution which preserves artefacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural or historical importance and makes them available to the public through exhibitions, which may be permanent or temporary.

 Nowadays, museums have gone out of its surrounding walls . Traditional museums are enclosed spaces, where the objects displayed in the galleries are housed within glass-enclosed spaces. But open-air museums are a category of museums that exhibit buildings and artefact collections outdoors and in the open air.  Example given : The Indira Gandhi Manav Sangrahalay in Bhopal .  Even the village of the primitive tribes of the jungle, untouched by modernity, can play the role of an open-air museum.

Image: Shree Jagannath 

Image: Shree Jagannath 

Image: Shree Jagannath 

Image: Shree Jagannath

Now the point of concern is …how to keep the Mahaprabhu’s RATHAS in the Open Air Museum without being dismantled .

Mahaprabhu Sree Jagannath  is not only the God of all Odias but He is the most worshipped deity of the whole world.  The exact literal meaning is ‘ Master of the Universe ‘ . Unique and wonderful is his human pastimes .  In Kalingan architecture, temples are imagined as human bodies, such as legs as foundation , waistline as fence , trunks, heads, etc ( Pistha, Bada,Gandi Mastak etc) .  Similarly, man has seen Thakura( God)  in his own human form within the temple.  But among all Gods , Shree Jagannath is unique only for His human pastimes, for example: taking bath in 108 pots of water on the full moon day ( snana purnima) , falling in fever afterwards ( Anasara ) , taking his siblings with Him to the Gundicha temple in a grand chariot journey ( Rath Yatra), etc.

 But there have been so many incidents in the past that Sree Jagannath’s temple has been attacked .  Not once or twice, the Jagannath temple is said to have been attacked eighteen times by Yavans or muslim invaders .  That is why Jagannath’s idol were shifted several times in the annals of history . In 1692 Rath Yatra was held inside the boundary wall ( Meghanada pacheri and Kurum bedha) of the temple.  That year, on the orders of Aurangzeb, his captain Akram Shah attacked the temple.  However, fearing an attack, the idol of Shree Jagannath was moved to the back of the temple of Devi Bimala. That’s why with the advent of modern day technology, it has become necessary to document and display all the aspects of Shree Jagannath ( both tangible and intangible) .

The three chariots should not be dismantled after the completion of this grand Rath Yatra. The state government should place these three huge RATHAS (chariots ) in a specially designed  open-air museum under a shade of about one hundred feet at Shreekhetra Puri.  Devotees and tourists who have not been able to visit the Rath Yatra for some reason, will be engrossed and enthralled by the sight of the chariots during their visit to Puri some other time of the year.

Arrangements should be made there to give the pilgrims and devotees an idea of ​​the grandeur and magnificence of the Rath Yatra. This will further spread the glory of Jagannath and enrich tourism.

 Let me give you the opportunity to go through the following article which describes in detail about the different amazing aspects of each of the Rathas.

Dr. Manoj Mishra 

Email: lunarsecstasy@gmail.com