Shitala Mata and Microbial Vacuum

Marut

Health, Immunity, Microbes

Mother Nature abhors microbial / viral vacuum. This is cardinal truth (सनातन सत्य). Granting that you take microbes as your enemy, antibiotics often only allows you to choose your enemy. You push X pathogens out and create vacuum for Y pathogens, another set of enemies. The foolish war plan ever.

Shitala Mata
Shitala Mata

For healthy life, consider microbes as your friends. In difficult situation when your immunity is compromised, seek shelter from dynamic medicines i.e. live plant based medicines which has intelligence to push pathogens selectively without affecting friendly bacteria. Antibiotics are dead code. They don’t have intelligence.

In this season, across the world, human immunity observe downfall. It is compromised. So epidemics are inevitable if you do not take care. Pharma companies exploits them every 2-3 years by giving new names. Bird flu, swine flu, H1N1, ebola! All fancy names! Yes, these dead DNA imprints (Virus) are of different design but they essential become active because our immunity is compromised.

Indian life style suggest fasting during this season. Fasting boosts immunity. So epidemics don’t occur often here except in urban areas where modern life style is predominant over local culture. Fasting is made fun of by so called rationalists.शीतला सातम is considered अंधविश्वास-supersitiotions. Whereas, Almost all communities in India have some festival around the spring season that revolves around “stale food”. This overnight stale food is purposely kept at room temperature and often gets sour, but the custom is not to reheat the stale food and eat it for all meals the next day (शीतला सातम/શીતળા સાતમ in Gujarat). This has been a great way to introduce the body to the coming season’s probiotic as well as pathogenic microbes through overnight food. The probiotic bacteria help build good immunity, boosting gut flora, and the inoculation with pathogenic bacteria in small numbers prepares the immune system for seasonal illnesses by switching on the Immunoglobulin M protein, a basic antibody, as the first immune response.

Notably, this overnight meal is eaten on a day called Sheetalshashthi by Bengalis and around the same time of the year, by Marathis and Sindhis as well. It is supposed to bring immunity from small pox infections. MaaSheetala is considered the goddess who treats small pox and this ritualistic consumption of fermented food is interesting in this regard.
Sindhis call this festival Satam around the shrawan month and the stale food is called kanbo and includes fried fritters of the sweet and savoury variety. Mithila Brahmins also eat overnight stale daalpoori, kheer, sattu, badiyan (dried lentil cakes) and drink the extract of a herb called chirata, which is an immunity boosting agent. The association of this ritual in different communities with immunity is also notable.

Fear mongering will continue. Take a bold stand. Live life as per your rich glorious Bharatiya culture, live life as per seasonal change and save yourself every year from epidemics.

If you do not believe in nature’s laws, you are the king of rational arrogant educated fools. Don’t be one. Take care.

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