Ganesh Chaturthi Celebration in Italy

Ganesh Chaturthi in India is not a national festival like Diwali. However, the cute looking ‘vighnahartha’ has many followers in the western and south western part of India, where his birthday is celebrated in a very big way for ten days. It is commonly believed that Ganesha was reborn on sukla chaturdashi, which is also known as Ganesh Chaturthi.

Hindus residing outside India celebrate this event in their adopted motherland in a very traditional way. In France, celebrations are held in Paris, as well as in Genoa and Nice. Since this festival is very popular among the Maharastrians, lot of Marathi’s prefer to bring Ganapati home and worship ‘baapa’, as he is commonly called.

If you are not too keen in bringing bappa home, you can still be a part of the huge celebrations that takes place in the Sri Manikar Vinayakar Alayam temple of Paris. Keeping up with the tradition of Vinayak Jayati back home, the temple organises ten days of festivities. On the last and final day, a beautiful chariot is prepared adorned with innumerable flowers. The idol of Ganesh is placed on the chariot, which is driven through the street of Paris.

The chariot is hand pulled by many people, many of whom are local non- Hindu Parisians. ON the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi people wear traditional cloths and parade artefact during the procession.

Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations in France are more like a congregation of different faith, where people from different religious background come together to celebrate the birth of Lord Ganesha.