The Sheetala Ashtami vrat katha most families tell is the story of Sheetala Mata visiting a village in the form of an old woman, being scalded by the hot food and water of busy kitchens, and being cooled and fed only by a poor potter's wife, who gave her stale food from the day before. That is why, on Basoda, many homes light no stove and offer the goddess cool food cooked the previous day.
The day is the Ashtami of the dark fortnight after Holi; the date for your city and how the tithi is fixed are on the Sheetala Ashtami date page, and the tithi at sunrise is in the panchang. This page is only the story, told in our own words.
The old woman who came to the village
Long ago, at the end of winter, Sheetala Mata wished to see how the people of a certain village remembered her. She put aside her shining form and came down to earth as a very old woman, thin and bent, with a small bundle in her hand. It was the morning of the Ashtami.
She walked slowly down the lane. In every house the kitchen fires were burning. The women of the village were busy cooking puris, boiling rice and heating water, and nobody had time for a stranger. As she passed under the houses, one woman flung the boiling water from her rice out of a window; another emptied a pot of hot starch into the lane; a third, not looking, tossed out the scraps from a hot griddle. The water and the hot food fell on the old woman. Her skin blistered, and she cried out in pain.
She went from door to door asking for a little cool water and somewhere to sit. One woman said she was busy. Another said the floor had just been plastered. A third shut the door. The heat of the fires seemed to follow her down the lane.
At the very end of the village stood the hut of a potter. The potter's wife was not cooking that morning; the fire had not been lit, and what the family had to eat was food left from the day before. She saw the old woman stumbling and ran out to her.
She sat her down in the shade, brought a pot of cool water from the earthen jar and poured it gently over her head and arms. She fanned her with the edge of her sari. Then she said: I have nothing hot to give you, mother, only yesterday's food. And she set before her a little rabri, some cold rice and curd, and a jowar roti from the night before.
The old woman ate and drank, and the burning in her body went away. Then the potter's wife noticed something strange: under the old woman's hair, where she had poured the water, there seemed to be an eye on the back of her head. She was startled, and the old woman smiled.
The next moment the old woman was gone, and in her place stood the goddess: Sheetala Mata, seated on a donkey, holding a broom, a winnowing fan and a pot of cool water, with neem leaves about her. She blessed the potter's wife and her home. The potter's wife asked her for one thing only: that whoever honoured her on this day with cool food would have health in their house.
Reading the story calmly
Many tellings add that the rest of the village then fell ill, or that the houses were struck by fire, and that the villagers had to come to the potter's wife to learn how to make amends. Folk tales often reach for a dramatic turn like this to make their point. It is not a warning that cooking on the Ashtami brings illness to anyone. The story's real point is in its two halves: in the busy lane, nobody stopped for an old stranger; at the end of the village, the poorest woman did. The goddess was found in the person who needed water.
Sheetala Mata and illness
For centuries Sheetala Mata was prayed to during smallpox and other fevers with rashes, which were common at this turn of the seasons, and the cool water, the broom, the neem and the rest from the fire were all part of how families looked after the sick. It is right to say plainly that smallpox has been wiped out by vaccination, and that any illness today is for doctors, medicines and vaccines. The vrat is kept now as devotion to the mother goddess and as a day of cleanliness, cool food and attention to children's health.
Other tellings
- The two sisters-in-law. In some households the story is told of two women of one family: the elder cooks hot food on the Ashtami and her home is troubled, the younger offers stale food and is blessed, and the elder learns the custom from her.
- The king's daughter-in-law. Another version has a king's family whose children fell ill until a daughter-in-law kept Basoda and brought the custom to the palace.
- Gujarat's Shitala Satam. In Gujarat the day is kept as Shitala Satam, the Saptami of the dark half of Shravana by the Gujarati calendar, the day after Randhan Chhath, when the cooking for the next day is done.
How the katha is heard
Early on the Ashtami morning women go to the Sheetala shrine of the village or lane, or worship at home, with a thali of the food cooked the evening before. After the water, turmeric and roli are offered, the women sit together and an elder tells the story of the old woman and the potter's wife. The full order of the puja is on the Sheetala Ashtami puja vidhi page.
What the story carries today
Basoda gives the kitchen and the cook a day off, keeps food simple as the heat arrives, and asks families to sweep, wash and clean. Above all it asks the question the katha asks: who, in our own lane, needs a seat in the shade and a drink of cool water?
The festival comes about a week after Holika Dahan, and later in the year mothers keep another Ashtami for their children, Ahoi Ashtami. If you go to a temple and want a calm window, the choghadiya for your city helps.