Hemis Festival is celebrated to commemorate the birth anniversary of
Guru Padmasambhava, Gur Rimpoche, the founder of Tibetan Buddhism. According to legends, Guru Padmasambhava had fought with demons for the safety of the local people. The courtyard of
Hemis Gompa, the biggest Buddhist monastery in
Ladakh, is the center of Hemis festival. This festival is celebrated on the 10th day (Tse-Chu) of the Tibetan lunar month and the celebrations continue for 2 days.
The head lama presides over the festival. The Lamas perform splendid masked dances and sacred plays around the central flagpole. These masked dances invariably depict the victory of the right over evil. Masks worn by the lamas represent various guardian divinities of the Dugpa order, of which Hemis is the leading establishment in Ladakh. The dances end with the ritual destruction of a sacrificial offering of a human figure made of dough, by the leader of the Black Hat dancers. The pieces are then scattered in the four directions depicting a re-enactment of the assassination of the Tibetan apostate king Lang-dar-ma by a Buddhist monk in A D 842 or cleansing of the soul after death.
Every 12 years in the Tibetan Year of the Monkey, Hemis festival takes an auspicious turn. It is during this period the famous two-storey high ' Thanka' depicting Padmasambhava is displayed. The 'Thanka' is abundantly embellished with pearls and semi-precious stones.
