Religion, bonfires and an abundance of colored chalk — India’s Holi Festival is just one the world’s most beautiful celebrations.

On this day all faces are masked with colors, and social rules are relaxed in India. It’s of no surprise that numerous communities overseas are also jumping on this multi-colored bandwagon and wishing each other a ‘Happy Holi’ too. Every year, the Holi Festival brings a rainbow of chalk to the streets of India. The Holika bonfire is ignited the night before the Holi, bringing people gathered together for an evening of dance and song.

The following day, the bonfire gives way for a free-for-all carnival of color. Participants play, chasing each other with colored water and colored powder. This festival is celebrated to mark the triumph of good over evil and its main intention is to bring together strangers, uniting the rich and poor, men and women, children and elders — people who might not mingle otherwise. People are brought together to play and laugh, forget and forgive, to repair ruptured relationships.

Holi is basically a traditional Hindu festival, which is a way of expressing the rich cultural and traditional heritage but now it has become very popular with non-Hindus in South Asia, as well as communities outside of the continent also. In Europe it is celebrated in the form of a music festival, featuring songs accompanied by an exuberant riot of color on streets and buildings.

There are different forms of Holi Festival across India, the Lathmaar Holi Festival in Barsana (Mathura, UP) involves men with shields being beaten with women and bamboo sticks during which the men attempt to fight the women off by sprinkling them with colored chalks. In Delhi, it is celebrated in a modern way, as a music festival with live performances and traditional multi-colored powder throwing while in Jaipur it is celebrated as Holi Elephant Festival, featuring elaborately painted elephants, elephant polo, and tug of war. RBMI, Bareilly campus also celebrates colorful Holi festival every year with lots of music, dhol, live performances, and unlimited games along with throwing multi-colored powder.

The bitter image of this festival comes when some crowd celebrates this divine fiesta with Alcoholic Drinks, Synthetic Colors and Chemicals which becomes very dangerous for health as it may contain insoluble metal particles and other harmful elements too which may cause eye irritation or skin related problems. At the same time it generates serious environmental issues also as they pollute the water. Some use water balloons also whose careless usage creates plastic pollution too.

So despite behaving badly with others and celebrating this festival with negative tools, we should share our joy with others and must realize that it is a festival of love and friendship so it should be celebrated in a decent way by maintaining the real spirit of this festival.