Vinayagar Chaturthi 2015

Ganesh Chathurthi, also called Vinayakar or Pillaiyar Chathurthi, is a Hindu festival that is celebrated to honour the Lord Ganesha. The festival is observed in the Hindu month of Bhaadrapada, or Avani in the Tamil calendar, on shukla chathurthi. This date usually falls between August and September in the English calendar. In the northern parts of India, the festival lasts for 10 days, ending on Anant Chaturdashi i.e. the fourteenth day after the new moon (amavasai).
During the celebrations, images and idols of Ganesha are set up, both in public and at home, for ten days. At the end of the ten days, these idols are immersed in water - the sea, a river or a lake.

Legend goes that Ganesha was created out of sandalwood paste by Goddess Parvati. The sandalwood paste was one she used for her bath and this breathed life into the idol. She then told him that he must guard the door while she bathed. Her consort, Lord Shiva, who was out at the time, returned home to find an unknown boy guarding the door and not letting him enter his home. A battle between Ganesha and Shiva’s Ganas ensued, in which Ganesha won. An angry Shiva severed the child’s head as a result. When Parvati came to know what had happened, she was enraged, which made Shiva promise that he will bring the boy back to life. All the devas searched high and low for the head of a dead person that faced North. The only thing they could find was that of an elephant. They brought back the elephant head and Shiva fixed it to the body of the dead child. When the boy came back to life, Lord Shiva proclaimed that he would be called Ganesha - the lord of the Ganas.