bali padyami

My mother used to make balidra's kote. I cannot remember how it was done and why it was done. can any one out there help me with this. My mother is long gone and no one in the family is able to tell me. Please help
jaisree

Hello jaisree,
Bali Padyami is celebrated in my parents' house. This is a festival celebrated on the 3rd day of Deepaavali. First being Naraka Chaturdashi,
second, Dhanlakshmi/Kedareswara pooja and the third is Bali Padyami.

This festival is in the remembrance of Chakravarthy (Emperor) Bali who was a grand son of Prahlada, the greatest devotee of Vishnu. He was
reigning/ruling the world well. But it was his ego which was checked by Lord Hari. He comes as Vamana and asks for space measuring 3 feet for which bali readily agrees thinking that the Brahmin cannot ask something impossible..

Then Vamana grows in size and then takes the entire earth by one foot, the land offered by Bali. Then the second feet is occupies the entire aakaasa.. space.. When he took second foot then Brahma washed his feet.. that is what is sung by Annamachaaryulu. For the third, Bali offers
himself, as he did not have anything else.. But by then Bali's ego or ahankara fully nullified. Bali was pushed down to Patala. And he became a great Daani.. such a giver who offered daanam to the Lord himself, the giver of givers. So the Lord then gives him a boon that one day in an year he will be remembered for his deed.

Underlying cause: Bali had become a menace for Devas according to them !

So we celebrate Bali Padyami.

Kota veyyadam ante.. deeni prameyam.. it is symbolic of Bali's fort.. with soldiers inside..
Usually gummaDi puvvalato alankaristaaru. dorakka pote edaina pojaarhamaina puvvalu vaadavachchunu.
meeku kota vesedi telusa?
kote is put out of cow's dung. My mother puts like this.. A central square and 4 squares adjacent to this central square such that each outer
sqaure shares a side with that of the central square. then Conical shaped structures are done and kept on the circumference of this fort
and also little bigger ones representing commandoes are kept inside...

Was it like this..that your mother used to put?

yes, something like this. I have to see it I am just not able to imagine this. I do not remember cow dung I thougt she made it out of flour. can you make a drawing and post it. thank you
jaisree

Hi Jaisree,

We do like how Kalyani explained. My mom used to say that if we dont find cow dung, we can do it using rice floor too. We keep the conical structures with a flower on it at every door. We usually put this fort in front of tulasi plant. We burst a few crackers in front of this fort too.

We make the fort with one central square and a bigger square outwards. And each of the corner is decorated with one conical structure. In the central square we keep 8 conical structures just like a small square. And 4 conical structures on each of the outer squares. That way we use 16 conical structures.

My granny used to do this...now I see my mom and mil doing too!

Jaisree thanks for posting the query because of which I too came to know the significance of celebrating
bali padyama.Thanks to Kalayani for explainign it.This is exactly the reason why we celebrate onam
in Kerala,it is beleived the Mahabali/Bali will visit our home on thiruonam. The story is exactly the same
except that he is mentioned as the ruler of Kerala(prahlada's grand son).