On Oct. 25, community members celebrated Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights. Approximately 200 people attended the annual candle lighting on the Green, according to attendee and Dartmouth India Association vice president Olivia Tak ’28.
The event — organized by the Hindu student organization Shanti — included a Hindu prayer, a candle-lighting ceremony on the Green, cultural performances at the Engineering and Computer Sciences Center and a homemade dinner.
Shanti cultural coordinator Chadani Timsina ’26 said that the Diwali celebration was “beautiful” and that it is her “favorite holiday.”
“We have all of our communities together, all our families together, we make food and it’s a day of celebration,” Timsina said. “It’s very significant.”
Timsina said that while Diwali is a Hindu holiday, Shanti wants “all of the students at Dartmouth” to come to the annual campus celebrations.
The event began with the puja, in which “students go up and they chant prayers,” according to Timsina. This was followed by the candle-lighting ceremony, which this year used artificial candles instead of traditional candles and diyas — which are oil lamps — due to a statewide fire ban.
Ansh Oswal ’29, who volunteered for the event, said the artificial candles were “a little annoying.”
“One of the most fun things you do in Diwali is use one candle to light the next,” Oswal said. “You kind of lose out on that.”
Timsina agreed that needing to use the artificial candles was “a little sad.”
“The whole point of Diwali is candles and light, and it felt a little sad that that didn’t happen,” Timsina said. “But I understand, sometimes we have to prioritize safety.”
Malhar Patel ’29 said that despite the change, “seeing the whole Green lit up” was “a cool sight.”
After the candlelighting ceremony, celebrants watched a series of 16 cultural performances in the ECSC building, according to Timsina.
Oswal, who performed at the event, said he played the guitar in a duet with a singer.
“We performed a medley of Hindi songs,” Oswal said. “We thought that people would associate [the songs] with some sort of happy memories.”
Oswal added that half of the cultural performances were “very classical,” while the other half were more modern. He noted that classical Indian dance training can last for 10 to 15 years.
“For [classical dancers] to have an outlet to perform to showcase the fact that they’ve mastered their craft is really important,” Oswal said.
The festivities ended with a traditional dinner made by graduate students and other members of the Upper Valley community. Patel said the food “was really good” and “felt very authentic.”
“You can tell the difference between homemade food and restaurant food,” he said. “It was great to have some good, authentic Indian food.”
Oswal said that the Diwali celebrations can make Indian students at Dartmouth feel “connected to home.”
“Having a celebration like that at Dartmouth at that scale makes you feel like, in a small way or a big way, you’re back home with the people you care about most,” Oswal said. “I think that’s really important.”
