On 10 September 2021, Ganesh Chaturthi was celebrated in remembrance of Lord Ganesh in India. Every year a statue of Lord Ganesh is submerged in the water as a part of a ritual in Bhadrapada (August-September) month of the Hindu calendar. This festival is celebrated for ten days and is believed that whoever worships Lord Ganesh becomes free of his sins and goes onto the path of wisdom. But what is the history behind Lord Ganesh? Lord Ganesha is also known as Ganapati is the god of Obstacle remover, intelligence, and wisdom, ruler of the first chakra. It is said that he removes the obstacles from both spiritual as well as the materialistic world. This is why many people worship him before they begin anything new. He is also known as the creator. Over the years, a lot of shift has been there regarding the role of the lord Ganesh.
Lord Ganesh’s birth has been a unique one. Even though there are a lot of stories related to the birth of Lord Ganesh but this has been the most popular one and ought to be the real one. One day Devi Parvati was preparing a bath for herself and as she did not want to be disturbed by anyone so she told Nandi, bull of lord Shiva to guard the doors. Soon after some time lord, Shiva came and as it was his habit, he wanted to go inside the house. He ordered Nandi to let him through the doors. Since Nandi was first the servant of Lord Shiva before Devi Parvati, he did not stop him and allowed him to go. On seeing this Devi Parvati got really angry since she had no loyal person for herself. After this incident, she decided to create a human form out of her body dirt, gave life to him, and declared him as her own loyal son. The next time when Devi Parvati went to take bath she told Ganesh to guard the doors. This time again as it was the natural habit of lord Shiva he wanted to go through the doors and ordered Ganesh to let him in but since he was very loyal to Devi Parvati the creator of his life, he denied entry to lord Shiva. Lord Shiva was enraged by the fact that some random boy was denying him entry to his own house. Both of them were unaware of the father-son relationship they both had. Lord Shiva in anger told his army to destroy the boy but since lord Ganesh was the son of Devi Parvati, no one could defeat him. The angry and the surprised deity decided to take the matter into his own hands and beheaded the head of the boy guarding the door. After bathing when Devi Parvati saw her own son lying dead on the floor she got so enraged that she decided to wipe the whole of mankind. Lord Brahma being the god of the creator pleaded with her to not take such actions. She said if her two conditions were fulfilled only then she wouldn’t take such a step. Her first condition was to bring Ganesha back from dead. It was impossible to put the head back on the body so lord Shiva ordered Nandi to bring back any creature from the forest whose face was towards the north direction. Nandi brought back the head of an elephant from the forest whose face he found towards the north direction. Shiva placed the head of the elephant on the body and brought him back to life. Even though Ganesha was brought back to life Parvati had some fears. She feared that he would be mocked by everyone and no human would ever worship a god who had an elephant head. So to avoid such circumstances Devi Parvati’s second wish was to make Ganesha worship before all the gods. That's why he was also named Ganpati which means leader amongst everyone. To fulfill her wish Shiva asked all the gods to bless Ganesha with such blessings that he would be always worshipped at the beginning of the ritual, occasion before any other god. There is one such another story too which shows his wisdom where he and his brother Kartikeya was asked to go around the world three times to get the fruit that would give them wisdom and knowledge for which they were fighting Kartikeya had peacock as a pet. So he took him and flew into the sky and started his journey but Ganesha’s pet was a rat that couldn’t fly and cover that long distance. So instead of panicking he used his wisdom and circled around his parents three times and said that his parents were his world. Touched upon by this lord Shiva declared him as the winner and gave him the fruit.
Lord Ganesha has a lot of stories that are not only interesting to read but also eye-opening. Every story teaches something, every story has life lessons. For example, the story of him and Kartikeya gives the moral value to not panic when you come across a situation where you don’t have enough resources rather make the best use of those which are available. His stories are really educational which can really be helpful for young children.