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More than 200 people dressed up in their best sarees and ghagras Friday night to participate in Garba, an Indian circle community dance that celebrates a Hindu goddess and marks the passage of time.
Participants danced in concentric circles twirling, clapping and snapping in a sweeping movement from side to side.
Desis of Doylestown, a Bucks nonprofit that counts among its members people of Bangladeshi, Indian, Nepali, Pakistani and/or Sri Lankan descent, hosted the event at Unami Middle School in Chalfont, Bucks County, to raise money for their fourth annual free Diwali celebration at the Pearl S. Buck House on Oct. 27.
Friday’s event, planned by Desis of Doylestown’s youth group, is just a small taste of what the holiday looks like in India and, more specifically, in the western state of Gujarat, said Darshana Patel, secretary of the Desis of Doylestown board. There, tens and thousands of men and women gather in communal spaces and dance the entire night for nine nights in veneration of Navaratri, or the festival of nine nights, which is dedicated to the divine feminine supreme Durga.
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