154 PANDALS OR PAVILIONS
Hindus purify their bouses day by day from the defilements caused by promiscuous goers and comers. It is the rule amongst the upper classes to have their houses rubbed over once a day with cow- dung, but in any class it would be considered an unpardonable and gross breach
of good manners to omit this ceremony when they expected friends to call or were going to receive company.
This custom appears odd at first sight, but it brings this
inestimable benefit in its train, that it cleanses the houses where it is in use from all the insects and vermin which would otherwise infest them.
Pandals.
All the more important Hindu ceremonies, such as upanayana, marriages, & c, take place under canopies
made of leaves and branches of trees which are erected with much pomp and care in the courtyard or in front of
the principal entrance door of the house. The pandal is usually supported by twelve wooden posts l or pillars, and covered with foliage and branches of trees. The top or
ceiling is ornamented with paintings or costly stuffs, while the whole is hung with garlands of flowers, foliage, and many other decorations. The pillars are painted in alternate bands of red and white. The pandals of rich people are often exquisitely decorated. A propitious day, hour, and star are always chosen on which to erect these canopies.
Then the relations and friends all assemble to set up the centre pillar, which is called the muhurta-kal, and to which they offer puja to the accompaniment of music. Under this canopy all the ceremonies connected with the fete take place, and the guests remain underneath it till the end of the performance. The houses of Hindus are not as a rule sufficiently spacious, or in any way well adapted for receiving large numbers of guests, so necessity has suggested this picturesque alternative.
Besides these pandals, which are only used on grand occasions, upper-class people generally have a permanent
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Amongst the Sudras it is only those who belong to the Right-hand faction who are allowed to have twelve pillars or posts to their pandals.
If a Left-hand Sudra, who is only entitled to eleven, should take upon himself to put twelve, a frightful fracas would ensue. Dubois.