Dhanteras and its significance: How Goddess Lakshmi holds the key

Dhanteras, Goddess Lakshmi, wealth creation, auspicious beginnings and the rituals concerned go hand in hand. Dhanteras is the first day of the five days' long Diwali festival. This year, Dhanteras falls on October 25th. In Hindu mythology, this special day is considered auspicious because Goddess Lakshmi emerged out of the milky ocean after the churning by both gods and demons. The day holds a special significance for people belonging to the trading community, as it is considered auspicious by them for making business deals.

Dhanteras is celebrated with great enthusiasm across India. People prefer to shop for gold and silver jewelry, utensils etc. on this day. Dhanteras is also regarded as an auspicious time to plan wedding dates, purchase cars and houses, start new business ventures, throw housewarming parties and more. 

Increasingly, this day has a huge business connection across industries too, including finance. In fact, the trend is fast catching on with people starting their investments in financial products on this day including mutual funds, bank deposits and more. The theory that is working in this direction can be put in the form of a question - being that why should people stick to just shopping for retail products like phones, TVs, fridges, clothes etc? They should also add investment options to their shopping cart too and this includes mutual funds, FDs, gold ETF and more.

Different parts of India celebrate Dhanteras differently, but their objective is to purchase some form of precious metal or utensils - ideally, it should be gold and silver, but any form of metallic object will do. This is considered an auspicious thing to do to ensure wealth keeps rolling in for the individual or the family. 

Goddess Lakshmi Rituals

When people carry out relevant rituals linked to the Goddess Lakshmi, they may gain wealth going forward. To celebrate this festival of wealth and prosperity, a hymn/prayer is sung to honour the goddess, earthen lamps are lit and placed all night, rangolis in ethnic motifs are designed at the main entrance of the house and small footprints are imprinted there that are coming in, which symbolically means the arrival of the goddess. It is believed that this brings wealth and prosperity into the household. However, customs vary from region to region. 

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