Being urban Indians, I always found it strange that my father-in-law would refer to the people in my community/caste as ‘tribesmen’. Somehow, I associated the word tribe with a people who are not part of the mainstream society, an ethnic group with a distinct identity.

But I finally begin to understand why he preferred the word tribe to caste or community because those words have shades of hierarchy and are associated with social mobility. so in that respect, tribe seems a more ‘woke’ way of describing a group of people who have a distinct cultural identity. And Parshuram is our progenitor.

Parshuram, it is said, was a robust Brahmin who took to arms to protect people from tyrannical rulers. And back in antiquity, he brought to life 14 dead brahmins on the West Coast of India and gave them a strip of land to call their own from the highest mountain till as far as his arrow could reach. This narrow strip is known as the Konkan and the descendants of the 14 brahmins are my ancestors, the Kokanastha Brahmin.

significance of Akshay Tritiya

Apart from being Parshuram’s birthday, Akshay is the third day in the month of Vaishakh, when the sun is at its brightest during the day and the moon is at its brightest at night. Akshay means endless or eternal and is considered one of the auspicious days in the Hindu calendar. So if you want to start anything new, you don’t have to find a suitable time because every moment of this day is a lucky moment.

Many people mark this day by purchasing some gold, which is a really good investment. For those people who have been observing this tradition over the years, this was a good way of accumulating a tidy nest egg

It is also a good day for weddings and thread ceremonies, and many people, including yours truly, were married on this day.

Happy Akshay Tritiya.

Ciao