In the Tamil calendar, the month of Aadi starts mid-July and ends in mid-August. It is generally considered to be an inauspicious month and in this period, no weddings take place, no major purchases are made and no new activity is launched. Why, in certain parts of Tamil Nadu, even recently married couples are separated during this month and the bride is sent to her parents' place. She stays there till the next month starts!
The root of this practice can be traced to India's past as a largely agrarian economy. The harvest would have happened about a couple of months earlier and it would require another three months or so for the next harvest to take place. As such, liquidity would be a huge issue for the farmer with the money from the previous harvest having largely dissipated either in consumption or in planting of the next crop. Even with India's transition toward a manufacturing and now a services-based economy, these traditions have persisted. By and large, nothing auspicious is started in this month in Tamil Nadu. Right now, a new restaurant is coming up three buildings from my house. I have been following this a bit intently to see when it is formally opened as there are still about three weeks for Aadi to be over.
About three decades ago, I used to be a Sales Manager in LML. One day, while I was sitting with my Chennai dealer, a customer walked in and requested the dealer for an expedited delivery of a scooter he had booked. He wanted it to be registered and on the road before the advent of Aadi , which was starting in a week's time. The dealer understood the sentiments and noted the customer's details down. Both of us did a double take when we heard his name as it was Abdul Ghafoor, typically Muslim. The dealer asked Mr Ghafoor in curiosity if Muslims also believed in the Hindu tradition of Aadi being inauspicious. Mr Ghafoor was candid enough to say that they didn't but he didn't want to mess with local sentiment ! Just an example of how pervasive the belief about the inauspiciousness of Aadi was.
Further to the west from Tamil Nadu, in the state of Kerala, this month is known as Karkatakam and is considered to be equally not fortuitous for anything good - and for pretty much the same reasons based on the agrarian past. In fact, in Kerala, in many Hindu households, all the sixty eight chapters of the Sundara Kandam of the Ramayanam are read in a prescribed sequence so as to be completed within this month. The Sundara Kandam is the section of the Ramayanam which deals with Hanuman's journey to Lanka and his subsequent discovery of the abducted Sita. Reading this is supposed to bring success and hence, the reading in this month makes sense, once you keep in mind that the month is generally considered to be inauspicious.
What surprised me in Kerala when I was there recently - just before Aadi or Karkatakam started - was the sight of consumer durable and textile shops being plastered with posters advertising 'Special Aadi sales'. To be fair, a couple of the salespersons did confess that they did not know what Aadi was, but had decided to follow their counterparts from neighbouring Tamil Nadu.
I immediately connected this with the marketing spin in vogue in Tamil Nadu for maybe the last two decades - that of an Aadi Kondattam or celebration. Seeing the traditionally low sales in this month, some marketing genius a few years ago converted adversity into opportunity by advertising deeper discounts - so much so that this seems to have become a new tradition. There is now a new set of customers who are willing to brave the lack of auspiciousness of Aadi to defer purchases to this month to avail opportunities for sizable bargains.
Did I hear anybody say that traditions are set in stone and that no marketer can change it?!
The root of this practice can be traced to India's past as a largely agrarian economy. The harvest would have happened about a couple of months earlier and it would require another three months or so for the next harvest to take place. As such, liquidity would be a huge issue for the farmer with the money from the previous harvest having largely dissipated either in consumption or in planting of the next crop. Even with India's transition toward a manufacturing and now a services-based economy, these traditions have persisted. By and large, nothing auspicious is started in this month in Tamil Nadu. Right now, a new restaurant is coming up three buildings from my house. I have been following this a bit intently to see when it is formally opened as there are still about three weeks for Aadi to be over.
About three decades ago, I used to be a Sales Manager in LML. One day, while I was sitting with my Chennai dealer, a customer walked in and requested the dealer for an expedited delivery of a scooter he had booked. He wanted it to be registered and on the road before the advent of Aadi , which was starting in a week's time. The dealer understood the sentiments and noted the customer's details down. Both of us did a double take when we heard his name as it was Abdul Ghafoor, typically Muslim. The dealer asked Mr Ghafoor in curiosity if Muslims also believed in the Hindu tradition of Aadi being inauspicious. Mr Ghafoor was candid enough to say that they didn't but he didn't want to mess with local sentiment ! Just an example of how pervasive the belief about the inauspiciousness of Aadi was.
Further to the west from Tamil Nadu, in the state of Kerala, this month is known as Karkatakam and is considered to be equally not fortuitous for anything good - and for pretty much the same reasons based on the agrarian past. In fact, in Kerala, in many Hindu households, all the sixty eight chapters of the Sundara Kandam of the Ramayanam are read in a prescribed sequence so as to be completed within this month. The Sundara Kandam is the section of the Ramayanam which deals with Hanuman's journey to Lanka and his subsequent discovery of the abducted Sita. Reading this is supposed to bring success and hence, the reading in this month makes sense, once you keep in mind that the month is generally considered to be inauspicious.
What surprised me in Kerala when I was there recently - just before Aadi or Karkatakam started - was the sight of consumer durable and textile shops being plastered with posters advertising 'Special Aadi sales'. To be fair, a couple of the salespersons did confess that they did not know what Aadi was, but had decided to follow their counterparts from neighbouring Tamil Nadu.
I immediately connected this with the marketing spin in vogue in Tamil Nadu for maybe the last two decades - that of an Aadi Kondattam or celebration. Seeing the traditionally low sales in this month, some marketing genius a few years ago converted adversity into opportunity by advertising deeper discounts - so much so that this seems to have become a new tradition. There is now a new set of customers who are willing to brave the lack of auspiciousness of Aadi to defer purchases to this month to avail opportunities for sizable bargains.
Did I hear anybody say that traditions are set in stone and that no marketer can change it?!
****
No comments:
Post a Comment