TAWANG, Jan 23: The three days Torgya – a calendar monastic dance with rituals festival – began at the Tawang Monastery on Thursday.
The monastic dances in the courtyard of Tawang monastery started before day break with the famous Pha-Chham by the monks of Tawang monastery, who donned masks of pigs. This was followed by various other monastic dances.
In the evening, the ritual cake Zshor or Torgya was burnt amidst huge gathering of devotees from the villages, town of Tawang and people from Bhutan. Before burning the cake, the abbot and monks of Tawang Monastery performed rituals and chantings.
According to tradition of the area, this annual festival has been observed since the inception of the monastery to protect all sentient beings from natural calamity and untoward incidents, besides good crops.
In earlier days, a portion of grains collected by the monks from different villages were used for Torgya rituals.
On the second day, the abbot of the monastery will bless the devotees with long life initiation, and on the last day of the festival the monks will perform monastic dances for an entire day depicting various stories of Buddhist Siddhas and history of Tawang. (DIPRO)
