Thaipusam at Batu Caves

Murugan and the vel

Thaipusam takes its name from Thai, the tenth month of the Tamil calendar, and Pusam, the star the full moon is near on the day. It celebrates the victory of Murugan over the demon Surapadman. According to the Kanda Puranam, the Tamil version of the Skanda Purana, Murugan split Surapadman in two with the vel, a divine spear given to him by his mother Parvati; the halves became a peacock, which Murugan took as his mount, and a rooster, which he took as his flag. The festival is celebrated wherever there are Tamil communities — in India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Mauritius, South Africa and beyond — and in Malaysia it draws thousands of people to the Batu Caves and to the Arulmigu Balathandayuthapani Temple in Penang.

The Batu Caves are a series of limestone caves on a 325-metre hill in Gombak, about 13 kilometres north of Kuala Lumpur. The Tamil trader K. Thamboosamy promoted them as a place of Hindu worship; a temple to Murugan was completed in 1891, and the first Thaipusam was held there the next year. The complex, with many Hindu temples, now also has a 43-metre statue of Murugan.

Bearing the kavadi

Devotees prepare for 48 days by keeping clean, praying regularly, eating a vegetarian diet, fasting and remaining celibate. The heart of the festival is kavadi aattam: a kavadi, Tamil for “burden”, is in its simplest form a semicircle of wood or steel on a cross frame, balanced on the shoulders and carried as a vow — to ask Murugan’s help, to repay a spiritual debt, or for a loved one who needs healing. Many carry pots of milk, paal kudam, as an offering, or sugarcane, young coconuts and flowers. The most spectacular is the vel kavadi, a portable altar up to two metres tall and weighing up to 30 kilograms, decorated with peacock feathers and flowers and fixed to the devotee’s body with skewers and hooks pierced through the skin of the chest and back; some also pierce their cheeks or tongues. Holy ash, vibuthi, is spread over the body, and drumming and chanting help devotees enter a trance.

On the morning of Thaipusam a procession begins at the Sri Mahamariamman Temple in Kuala Lumpur, where a silver chariot weighing 350 kilograms, carrying the images of Murugan and his consorts Valli and Deivanai, sets out for Batu Caves, followed by devotees. After a ritual bath in the Batu River, the pilgrims make their way barefoot, dancing under their burdens, to the temple.