The Bow with holy paintings

Onavillu is a holy bow with paintings of gods depicted on it and is offered to Lord Sree Padmanabhan the presiding deity at Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple, Thiruvananthapuram on the day of Onam (Thiru Onam), during Onam Festival. By tradition, the right for making Onavillu for submitting it to the temple is vested with Vilayil Veedu, the family of carpenters and sculptors associated with the temple construction and they still follows this ritual. The bow is originally known as Palli Villu, but as it is associated with Onam festival, the Villu (bow) is popularly known as Onavillu. 

They make six pairs of Pallivillu, in three different sizes with each pair having similar paintings on it. It is then ceremoniously offered to the temple in the early morning on the day of Onam (Onam asterism in the month Chingom), during Onam festival. It is worshipped along with the respective idols of the deities for three days (Thiruvonam, Avittam and Chathayam ) and then taken to the palace of the titular Maharaja of Thiruvananthapuram.  

Onavillu is not a normal bow but a long piece of plank, broader at the middle. It is made of Cadamba tree. Mahogany is also used nowadays. For painting they use natural dyes turmeric (yellow), half-burnt coconut shell (Black), shell lime with turmeric (Red), white clay (white) and dried leaf of a particular tree (green) along with  Vajrapasha, a natural glue used as adhesive. 

The bigger one is of 4.5 ft length and a thickness of ¾ inches. The broadness at the centre of the bow is 6 inches. The painting depicted on it is Ananthasayanam (Lord Vishnu lying on top of Anantha, the snake God) and hence it is also known as Ananthasayanam Villu. This pair is dedicating to the main deity, Lord Sree Padmanabhan. The next size is 4ft length and 5.5 inches broader. There are three pairs in this size and the theme of painting on each pair are Dasavatharam (ten incarnations of Lord Vishnu), Sreerama Pattabhishekam (Lord Sreerama’s coronation and other scenes from Ramayan)  and Lord Sasthavu. These pairs are dedicated to the subsidiary deities Lord Narasimham, Lord Sreeraman and Lord Sasthavu respectively. The third size is 3.5ft length with broadness of 5inches. Two pairs are made in this size. The paintings Krishna Leela (childhood scenes of Lord Sreekrishna) is dedicating to the deity Lord Sreekrishna and the one with the paintings of Lord Ganapathy is to Lord Agrasala Ganapthy. 

Earlier there were only three pairs of Onavillu dedicated in this ritual ( bows of Anthasayanam, Dasavatharam and Krishnaleela). The ritual of submitting Onavillu with the theme Sreerama Pattabhishekam started in 1994 and the bows for Lord Sasthavu and Lord Vinayakan have been introduced since 2009.

A  legend behind this ritual is that, when Mahabali was thrown out from the Kingship and sent to the netherworld Pathalam by Vamana(the incarnation of Lord Vishnu in the form of a boy),  Mahabali wished to see the original form of Lord Vishnu. Then Vamana blessed Mahabali that during the annual visit of Mahabali to Kerala (Onam Festival), he will be able to see Lord Vishnu and his different forms through this Palli Villu. 

As it is believed that this holy bow will bring prosperity to your home, apart from the six pairs, which are for the royal family, they make about 1500 similar bows for the other devotees. The devotees can avail this by paying an amount to the temple authorities. So usually the family members start making the bows two months before Onam festival.

Bin Kumar Achari is the present head of the family. Apart from him, his brothers and cousins Sudarshan Achari, Sulabhan Achari, Umesh Kumar Achari, Karthikeyan Achari, all are involved in this craft. The young generation, their sons Ananthapadmanabhan, Mikhil Mahadev and Pranav Dev are also part of the process of making Onavillu. While submitting the bows ceremoniously to the temple, it decorates with silk/cotton threads in red with tassels (Thongal/ Kunjalam) tied as bow strings. Another interesting tradition connected with the making of Onavillu is that the tassels and bow strings are made by the prisoners of the central prison at Poojappura in Thiruvananthapuram. 

The temple of Adikesava Perumal in Thiruvattar (Kanyakumari District, Tamilnadu) also observes the ritual of offering Onavillu, during the Onam festival. Another traditional carpenter family in the locality is involved in the crafting of Onavillu there. 

Location/access: situated in Melarannur (Vaniyamoola), Karamana in Thiruvananthapuram.