ABSTRACT
In the city of Pune, about a five-hour drive from Bombay in the Indian state of Maharashtra, during the late morning of the day of the full moon in late June 1994, two women dressed in their finest saris. They prepared a brass plate with milk, rice, kum-kum (a red powder used to make forehead dots), tiny glass bangles, beads, and incense. Two small brass lamps were filled with ghee and fresh wicks. It was the day of Vatasavitri (Savitri's Fast), a ritual performed by married women on the full moon in early summer. This is a very popular ritual in Maharashtra, and many women were making the same preparations that day.
