WHEN THE SERPENTS DANCE: AN ENCHANTED NIGHT IN PADUBIDRI

Padubidri's Dakke Bali ritual reveals mystical snake worship traditions fading today.

- SANDHYA MENDONCA

Magical realism reveals a captivating reality, if only we pause long enough to experience it.

Rishab Shetty's film 'Kantara' had stirred up interest in our native tales of magic realism. I had just interviewed Stephen Huyler, an American anthropologist who has explored folk ethnographies in India. When I told our family priest in February that I planned to visit the Sri Krishna Temple in Udupi, he told me not to miss the biennial Dakke Bali ritual underway at Padubidri. The timing was serendipitous, and I set forth to witness it.

Dakke Bali is a form of snake worship practised by the Tulu community in the Dakshina Kannada district, especially in Padubidri. Dakke is a drum, and Bali means offering. The locals come in a procession from the Mahalingeshwara Mahaganapath to a clearing at the edge of the village - Khadgeshwari Brahmasthana - where the ritual is conducted. It starts after 11 pm and goes on until the early morning. Each evening during the month is hosted by a well-to-do person who also invites the entire neighbourhood for lunch. It's considered a great honour to be granted the opportunity to host it, and people wait years for their turn. The devotion runs deep; families pass down this privilege through generations, viewing it as both a blessing and a responsibility.

Ahead of the ceremony, local volunteers bedeck the area with just palm fronds and flowers, with the pingara, the white flower of the areca tree, being most favoured. These delicate pale strands create a sacred boundary between the mundane and the mystical. The next morning, the decorations are cleared away, leaving no trace, and everything is as it was in nature. This ephemeral beauty speaks to the philosophy of impermanence and respect for the natural world.