9 Traditional Indian Games And Toys On The Verge Of Extinction
Toys have existed in India since the Indus Valley Civilisation. 5000 years and these simple playthings evolved to what they are today. Toys and games were not only meant to keep children entertained, but also to teach them how to develop their minds and understand what life had in store for them. Unlike the fancy and expensive toys sold in stores today, traditional Indian toys and games were simple and took their inspiration from nature. They were designed on the basis of how a child would react to them and how it would apply to real life.
1. Rattles and Dug Dugi
Rattles have always been the single most favourite toy of infants, owing to the jingling noise it makes. A variant of the rattle is the dugg duggi. Traditional ones are made with wood and leather but improvisation takes place with paper. Paper is softened in water and used to form the core, which is then covered with paper and color. Strings, with mud balls or stones at the end, are attached to either side. The core is attached to a stick to resemble a lollipop. When the stick is shaken left to right, the mud balls or stones attached to the string on either side hit the core to produce sound.
Quite unlike the dolls of today. Traditional Indian dolls were made from the simplest materials varying from plant shoots, cloth and clay. At times, a mixture of cow dung, sawdust and clay were shaped into dolls and coated with bright paints.
Contrary to popular belief, dolls and toys were not just casual playthings, but were related to the social and religious rites of a community. In northern India, Janmashtami is related in its entirety by means of clay dolls. In South India, the Dasara festival is called Bommai Kolu or a display of dolls. The first wooden dolls are given to a girl from her parents during her marriage and are called Marapachi Bommai. As a custom, a married woman was supposed to add at least one doll to her collection every year.
3. Bagh Chal (Tiger and Goat)
This classic board game, which originated in Nepal, involves the use of logic and strategy as the goats had to use strategies to ward off and obstruct the path of tigers to avoid being "hunted down". The game play takes place in two phases. In the first phase, the goats are placed on the board while the tigers are moved. In the second phase, both the goats and the tigers are moved. For the tigers, the objective is to "capture" five goats to win.
These miniature versions of kitchen utensils and other household items were scaled down to the greatest detail and were made from copper and brass. These were played with by children as they watched their mothers cook and their family members make use of every day household items. Today, these miniature utensils give us an idea of what life was like in rural households.
The Pachisi board was made of cloth in a patchwork design. The four arms/limbs of the board are conjoined at the center called 'Char Koni'. Each arm of the Pachisi has three marked squares, which are called 'castles.' The game set comes with a set of 12 beehive shaped wooden pawns in colors of yellow, black, red, and green. The players throw cowrie shells on the Char Koni and the move of the pawns are determined by the number on the shells that fall with the open face. The objective of the game is to get all the four pawns, allocated to each player, to complete the round of the board as fast as possible. Today, the game has modern variants like Ludo and American Parcheesi.
6. Chauka Bara
Chauka Bara was a traditional race game similar to Pachisi where 2-4 players raced their respective coins on a board of 5x5 squares which the objective of who would reach the innermost square the fastest. Strategy was the main skill required to win the game as each player had 4 coins each and could move them at any time.
This game is said to have its origins in the Ramayana when it was created by Rama for Sita to pass her time in captivity. The game begins with six seeds placed in each cup. The player starting first picks up the seeds from any of the holes and, moving anti-clockwise, places one seed in each hole. If she reaches the end of her cups she goes on the other side of the board.
When the player drops the last seed she has, she takes the seeds from the next cup and continues placing them in this way. If the last seed falls into a cup with an empty cup following it, the seeds in the cup following the empty cup, are captured by the player. This game is played on Shivratri in the southern states.
Four handed Chaduranga is the predecessor of the modern Chess. The game is played by four players unlike two players on the conventional chess board and also involves the component of chance in the form of a single stick dice known as the daala. Four players form two teams of two players. Player-1 plays together with player-3, and player-2 plays together with player-4. Each player gets 8 characters each, 4 pawns, 1 elephant, 1 horse, 1 ship and 1 elephant.
Puppets were not only the tools of skilled puppeteers, they were also used by parents to tell stories to their children. Children also used puppets to create their own stories spurred by their imagination. It gave them a way to convey their emotions by transferring it to an inanimate object.
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