The decked-up Ram Lalla idol at the Ayodhya temple on the occasion of Ram Navami. (PTI)
“After pran pratishtha, Ram Navami was the first mega event for the Ayodhya temple. I thought of a combination of bright yellow and pink as yellow is a colour for celebration and pink denotes love, kindness and purity,” Manish Tripathi, the designer, tells News18
For Manish Tripathi, designing Ayodhya’s Ram Lalla’s clothes for Ram Navami is more than just a job. “It is a responsibility,” the man behind the pink and yellow clothes with gold and silver embroidery adorned by the idol on Wednesday.
Speaking to News18, Tripathi said, “It’s not just designing. Being a part of the fashion designing industry for over a decade now, designing attires is not a big deal. But an attire for Bhagwan Ram is more of a responsibility. It should be good enough. Being a Ram bhakt, I believe that He only guides me through the process.”
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The attire adorned by Ram Lalla after the divya abhishek mesmerised scores of devotees who visited the temple and watched the live stream. Chief priest Acharya Satyendra Das said, “This Ram Navami, the birth of Ram Lalla, is even more special as Bhagwan Ram is now in his abode.”
Tripathi is the designer behind uniforms for the Indian Army, Border Security Force (BSF) and jerseys for Indian Cricket Team.
THE CHOICE OF COLOURS
Tripathi, who had also designed the attire for the pran pratishtha ceremony held on January 22, said, “After pran pratishtha, Ram Navami was the first mega event for the temple. The look had to be grand. I thought of a combination of bright yellow and pink as yellow is a colour for celebration and pink denotes love, kindness and purity.”
He said as Lord Ram is an avatar of Lord Vishnu and is known as Pitambar, he chose the Pitambari fabric. “We got it made specially from the weavers of Kashi. Unlike the pran pratishtha attire, where we put multiple Vaishnav signs on the dress, this time, on his birthday, we only picked the lotus sign,” he said.
The fabric was a combination of silk and khadi, to which the thread work added a sophisticated look.
THE PRAN PRATISHTHA LOOK
Lord Ram’s attire for the grand consecration ceremony was the first task Tripathi undertook. “The consecration ceremony design was a huge task for me. However, I am thankful to Bhagwan Ram for helping me in meeting the high expectations of people who saw the deity after 500 long years,” recollected Tripathi, who started working on the clothes with his team of 15 a month ahead of the consecration ceremony.
He said his team spent hours and days with sculptor Arjun Yogiraj to know his expectations. Other than the consecration day attire, Tripathi and his team spent 40 days to make the attire for lord Ram for all seven days, based on the colour scheme provided by the temple trust.
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“Red attire is for Tuesday, green for Wednesday, yellow for Thursdays, green for Fridays, blue for Saturday and pink for Sundays while white is for Mondays,” he said.
Tripathi is thankful to UP CM Yogi Adityanath and temple trust’s general secretary Champat Rai for entrusting him with the responsibility. However, before undertaking the task, he said he had made it clear that he won’t charge a penny for his contribution towards Bhagwan Ram.