Dol Purnima

Dol or Dol Purnima or Dol Yatra is a major religious festival in India especially in Bengal and Odisha. This festival is known as Holi in various parts of India. People belonging to Hindu faith celebrate Dol Purnima in honour of Lord Krishna.

For the people of Bengal, there is yet another reason to celebrate this festival. This day marks the birth anniversary of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.

Dol Yatra is the last festival of Bengali year and celebrated from the ancient times. On this day, some people worship Radha and Krishna and after that people play with colours. In Bengal, colour powder is called “Phag”. Shops remain closed on this very auspicious day and everyone gets time to indulge themselves in the festival spirit.

It is also seen in Hindu family that, children’s apply colour powder or phag on the feet of their elders as a respect and the elder members apply the phag on the face of the young members on this day.

In West Bengal, Dol Purnima is called Holi. People celebrate it with most joy. People also called Holi as Festival of colours. The importance of Holi is that it brings all regions of people together. On this day, people throw colours on each other and drink Bhang.

Generally, Dol festival continues for one or two days depending upon the traditions of the society. But in Mathura and Vrindavan, Dol festival is celebrated for 16 days straight as Lord Krishna belongs to these two places.

Different people celebrate Dol festival in different way. Some celebrate it with colours or some celebrate it with the reunion of family and friends and for some Dol is a festival of eating mouth-watering eatables.