Open invitation for Shivaratri Pooja by SRSSM in Pakistan

By Gopinath Kumar (editor-in-chief)
Sunday, February 20, 2011

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Shri Ramdev Shiv Santosh Mandir (SRSSM)
Date: Sun, Feb 20, 2011 at 4:41 AM
Subject: Maha Shivratri Pooja...
To: Pakistan Hindu Post (PHP)

Namasty

Dear Gopinathji

          SRSSM Team Inviting you on 2nd March Maha Shivratri Pooja at Shri Ramdev Shiv Santosh Mandir, Al-Haider Society, Driag Road, Karachi

Pooja Timing
06:00 PM till 06:00 AM

Please come with your family and friends. May this Maha Shivratri gives you new prosperity and courage for your Dharma.

Regards,

Sanjesh Sunny
0333-2024170

Introduction : Maha Shivratri or Maha Sivaratri  (Great Night of Shiva or Night of Shiva) is a festival celebrated every year on the 13th night/14th day in the Krishna Paksha (waning moon) of the month of Maagha  in the Hindu Calendar (that is, the night before and day of the new moon). The festival is principally celebrated by offerings of Bael (Bilva) leaves to the Lord Shiva, all day fasting and an all night long vigil. Cannabis is traditionally used as an offering for Lord Shiva and his followers. Per scriptural and discipleship traditions, the penances are performed in order to gain boons in the practice of Yoga and meditation, in order to reach the goal more swiftly and avoid rebirth.

(Photo : 2010 Shivaratri Pooja celebration at Shri Ramdev Shiv Santosh Mandir in Karachi, Pakistan)

NOTE : PHP Executive team thanks to entire  SRSSM team and wishes them prosperity and success in there efforts for celebration of Shivratri festival in Pakistan. SRSSM is a non-profit mandli. Please Donate generously, through your contribution we will achive the mission. We all can change the change the Hindu community life in Pakistan.For donation contact on this email at saneshsunny@gmail.com

The PHP Team 

Modest Janmashtami celebration at camps in Pakistan

By Mangla  Sharma (PHP Karachi)
Wednesday, September 08, 2010

 (PHOTO : Hindu women with a kid standing on flood water in Sindh,Pakistan)

250,000 Sindhi Hindus forced to migrate by floods

KARACHI: Standing under the fancy canopy of a makeshift tent near a Gauchar, where sacred cows stand and Hindus feed them as part of religious rituals, 10-year-old Sumela and her cousin Deepa reminiscence about their village, where every year they enjoyed the celebrations of Janmashtami, an important religious festival marking the birth of Lord Krishna.

Fate has forced them to stay silent on such an important Hindu festival, which was celebrated on Wednesday, as it was not possible to celebrate the occasion with the same vigour in a relief camp. Both cousins remember how every year they enjoyed the celebrations with special foods, however, at the relief camp, they were being given boiled rice and gram.

The girls, with their families, shifted to a flood relief camp in Swami Narain Temple in Karachi set up by local Hindus, after floodwaters inundated their town completely. Both girls are close friends and residents of Mirpur Bathoro, a small town in Thatta district, which is located in the Indus delta region and being at the end, it is the worst affected district of Pakistan.

Not only Sumela and Deepa, another 250,000 Hindus of Sindh, who left their native villages and towns and shifted to relief camps after the flood, could not celebrate the religious festival of Janmashtami. The celebrations comprising special foods, prayers, visits to temples, religious rituals, recitation of bhajans and fasting, which are supposed to be an essential part of the festival, are impossible to arrange at the relief camps.

Pakistan Hindu Foundation (PHF), a representative body of Pakistani Hindus, has estimated that floods have severely affected 250,000 Hindus living near the Indus River and forced them to leave their native places.

The last national census stated that with a population of 3 million, Hindus are the biggest religious minority in the country while a majority of them are peasants, living in different districts of the Mirpurkhas division.

“Around 0.6 million Hindus live in the northern districts of Sindh while 250,000 were displaced from Kashmor, Jacobabad and Shikarpur, and have been shifted to camps,” said PHF president DM Maharaj.

Most of them preferred to stay away from relief camps and rushed to temples, but the majority of them were poor and the so-called upper caste Hindus did not allow them to enter the temples.

Jaitan Bai, a Baghari by caste, was sitting outside the Swami Narain Temple but the temple management and Pakistan Hindu Council officials have barred her family from entering the temple. She alleged that she was disallowed because of her caste.