Nag Panchami is one of the important Indian festivals, and is celebrated on the fifth day of the moonlit-fortnight in the month of Shravan (July / August). This is the time when serpents invariably come out of their holes that get inundated with rain ­ water to seek shelter in gardens and many times in houses. As such they pose a great danger to man.
Maybe therefore, snakes are worshipped on this day. In India even before the Vedic times, the tradition of snake-worship was in vogue.
The Legend :
In ancient India, there lived a clan by the name of 'Nagas' whose culture was highly developed. The Indus Valley civilisation of 3000 B.C. gives ample proof of the popularity of snake-worship amongst the Nagas, whose culture was fairly wide-spread in India even before the Aryans came. After the Naga culture got incorporated into Hinduism, the Indo-Aryans themselves accepted many of the snake deities of the Nagas in their pantheon and some of them even enjoyed a pride of place in the Puranic Hinduism.
The prominent Cobra snakes mentioned in the Puranas an Anant, Vasuki, Shesh, Padma, Kanwal, Karkotak, Kalia, Aswatar, Takshak, Sankhpal, Dhritarashtra and Pingal. Some historians state that these were not snakes but Naga Kings of various regions with immense power.
The thousand-headed Shesh Nag who symbolises Eternity is the couch of Lord Vishnu. It is on this couch that the Lord reclines between the time of the dissolution of one Universe and creation of another. Hindus believe in the immortality of the snake because of its habit of sloughing its skin. As such Eternity in Hinduism is often represented by a serpent eating its own tail.
Nag Panchami is celebrated throughout India; however, more festivities are seen in the south than in the north.The village of Baltis Shirale, which is situated approximately 400 kilometres (approximately 250 miles) from Mumbai, conducts the most outstanding of all the celebrations. Reportedly, the largest collection of snakes in the world can be found in Baltis Shirale. Visitors from all over the world gather in the village to worship live snakes. Interestingly, despite no venom being removed from the snakes, no one has never been bitten. Other popular areas of worship during the Nag Panchami include:
* Adiesha Temple in Andhra Pradesh
* Nagaraja Temple in Kerala
* Nagatharnman Temple in Chennai
* Hardevja Temple in Jaipur.