Jhulelal

The deity of the Sindhi Hindus, and the one god on this almanac whose people have no territory. He is Varuna of the Indus under the name Sindh gave him: the lord of the river and of water, held to have been born at Nasarpur on the bank of the Indus to turn a ruler from forcing the conversion of the Hindus of Thatta. Amarlal is the immortal child, Uderolal the one who rose, Lal Sain the red lord, and Zinda Pir the living saint, which is the name he is given by Sindhi Muslims who keep him too. He is worshipped not in a temple so much as at a darbar, and in a community that was moved out of its homeland in 1947 the darbar is what travelled: Ulhasnagar, Ajmer, Jaipur, Bhopal, Indore, Ahmedabad and the trading diaspora from Dubai to Hong Kong to Lagos each built their own.

An old man with a white beard, seated on a pala fish, holding a book, and often shown as a child at the same time in the same picture, because he is both Amarlal the infant and the elder who rose from the river. The thing actually worshipped is not the image but the Behrana Sahib: a brass or copper pot filled with water with a lit jyot standing on its mouth, a coconut wrapped in red cloth, and dates, sugar, cardamom, fruit and flowers on the tray around it. That is set, carried in procession and given to the water, which is the whole shape of the worship.

Identified with Varuna, the Vedic lord of the waters and of the oath, so the river is his rather than a place he is found at. No consort and no children are told of him in the Sindhi accounts; what is told is a birth at Nasarpur, to Ratanchand Thakur and Devki, in answer to forty days of prayer on the bank of the Indus. He stands beside the Guru Granth Sahib in a great many Sindhi darbars, since much of the community is Nanakpanthi, and the two are kept in one room without either being made a form of the other.

At the darbar and at home, with no priesthood required: the jyot lit before the picture, the panjras sung in the evening, the akho of rice and sugar offered and given out, and the Behrana Sahib set and carried to whatever water is nearest: the sea at Mumbai, a tank or a lake inland, a well where there is neither. The chhej is danced in front of the procession and the name is called out along the road. The langar at the darbar is part of it and not an extra, which is the Nanakpanthi inheritance showing.

Sindhi

The deity of the community, kept at the darbar rather than at a temple, and carried wherever it settled. Ulhasnagar, built for Sindhi refugees after 1947, holds the largest Cheti Chand procession anywhere; Ajmer, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Bhopal, Indore, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Pune each hold their own, and the diaspora darbars keep the same morning.

Maharashtra

Ulhasnagar is the centre of it, and the Sindhi darbars of Mumbai, Thane and Pune keep Cheti Chand and the Chaliho with the state’s own calendar around them.

Rajasthan

Ajmer, Jaipur and Jodhpur took in large numbers in 1947 and 1948, and their darbars are among the oldest outside Sindh.

• Cheti Chand · Jhulelal Jayanti
• Chaliho Sahib
• Chaliho Sahib ends · Thanksgiving Day