Maavilakku poojai

Maavilakku poojai is ideally performed on a Friday omitting the first and last Friday of the Aadi month. The procedure for performing maavilakku poojai is as follows.

In my family

We keep kuzhavi,chooral and a wooden board. Then we make and apply turmeric paste on the wooden board. We place 25 red dots 5 rows and 5 columns. We draw maakolam (Rangoli made using rice paste) in the pooja room. Wash the Kuzhavi well. Then we make turmeric paste into a thick round and place on it. We place two red dots with kumkum on the turmeric paste as eyes and as pottu.

Spread the sand in front of the wooden board.We place the kuzhavi on the sand. We also keep a brass sombu filled with water and neem leaves. Then we also place a bunch of neem leaves and red colour flowers. Along with it we place the chooral(wooden stick). On the side we place and light the kuthuvilakku. On a large plate, we place rice flour with jaggery and ghee in it. This is how we perform the pooja in my house.

The tradition is, whatever is cooked for the day, we place it before Amman. Also after we light the lamp, no more tempering with mustard seeds will be done in the home, for the day. Normally we make molagootal, rasam, pachadi on that day. We also place a glass with water. And we remove only on the next day. Once we place the neiveydhyam we close the door. It is a belief that the Goddess will come and eat those food. Now we will sit outside the pooja room and chant amman slokas and songs. After 10 minutes we should clap our hands twice before opening the door. And then the karpoora harathi is shown to the God. Vethilai paaku is given to the sumangalis.