ABSTRACT
The Tesu Jhenjhi festival is one such jewel studded in the glorious folk tradition of Bundelkhand. The festival begins simultaneously with nine-day worship of Durga during which the adolescent girls participate in Gauri pooja. In the seventh lunar month, during the moonlit fortnight, girls erect a mud platform on nine steps. This ceremony of Gauri pooja is followed by the girls and boys playing the marriage rituals of Tesu and Jhenjhi. From the ninth day of the bright half of the seventh lunar month, girls and boys make two groups. The boys carry the image of Tesu in the evening to almost all the homes in a community. They sing Tesu songs and ask for money for the marriage of Tesu. similarly the group of girls carries Jhenjhi door to door collecting finances to arrange the marriage. Festivals of this kind are the epicentres for cultural awareness providing a suitable atmosphere for social gatherings.
