Holi is around the corner and if there is excitement about having a splash with colours, and taking colourful selfies for Insta, there is also a worry in the back of many people’s minds about what the Holi colours can do to their skin, hair and eyes.
Portrait Of Young Indian Woman With Colored Face Dancing During Holi
Over the years, with a rising consciousness among consumers and a growing market catering to it, natural, organic, or herbal holi colours are easier to find on supermarket shelves these days. Organic stores in most localities have great options. Even regular online grocery sites and e-commerce sites have a gamut of choices to offer. Gone are the days when you went to the store at the street corner and picked up these ubiquitous plastic packets with bright yellow, blue, purple and pink gulal bursting out of them.
The deal with the regular colours is that many are suspected to be made with industrial dyes, which give them that bright dazzling hue – metallic oxides, acids, and other similar components that irritate and harm the skin and eyes.
Natural colours, on the other hand, use plants, vegetables, turmeric roots, leaves – which is how Holi was originally celebrated, with the fresh offerings of spring. Popular ingredients include beetroot, hibiscus, marigold, with wheat or maida flour, arrow root powder as a base.
Shriti, mother of eight-year-old Pranav, living in Bengaluru’s JP Nagar area says she switched to natural colours about two years ago. “Till then I didn’t know such colours were available. During our apartment Holi celebrations I saw some people using them and realised they were easier to clean off,” she explains. While normal chemical colours stay on the body for two or three days, natural colours wash off easily, she reiterates. “Otherwise you have to scrub really hard to get that red tinge off your skin.”
Over the last two years she has found natural and herbal colours even in the neighbourhood bangle store or supermarket. “This year I didn’t have time so I ordered online. I look for the label which says ‘organic’, ‘non-toxic’ or ‘herbal’. Of course I assume the label is telling the truth. But the last two years, whatever I picked worked for me,” she admits. She has found a four-colour pack set this time. She estimates that more than 50 % of people in their apartment last year had used natural Holi colours.
Most Ayurvedic product companies and natural cosmetic companies produce small batches of natural colours just in time for the festive Holi season to meet the surging demand. Aroma Essentials, founded by Madhurima Ramakrishna, who has studied cosmetology, makes these products, to customer demand, with clay as a base ingredient, because clay acts as an exfoliator for the skin and helps in removing toxins. Some like Prakriti Organic Food, that basically deal with organic food products and run by homeopathic doctor, Dr Ranjana, have come up with natural colours made in a base of pink rose petals, blue orchids, tulsi, and flame of the forest flowers (commonly called tesu in North India). Ohriya Royal Ayurveda dips deep into the Ayurvedic tradition to create among others, a red natural Holi colour made from beetroot powder, pomegranate peels, ratanjot powder (a herb used in religious rituals as well as a natural food colourant, specially in roghan ghosh), and dry rose petals.
While keeping chemicals away from our skin, efforts are also being made to move away from chemicals and plastics so that the environment too is not harmed. Seed Paper India offers a pack of flower extract colours with seed bombs that grow into plants, complete with coco pots, all in eco-friendly packaging. Hara Pitara also offers eco-friendly Holi colours from common plant extracts, packaged in paper pouches.
Priya Sondhi switched to organic colours about five years ago for the sake of her now 10-year-old daughter. “Children these days are very sensitive and get rashes from strong, chemical colours. Almost 80 % of families in our apartment have switched to organic colours,” she says. She is not very particular about the brand and finds her neighbourhood supermarket pretty well stocked this season. “It is definitely more expensive compared to chemical colours, but that is fine as far as health is not compromised.”
Prayagraj: Students play with colours ahead of Holi festival, in Prayagraj (Allahabad), Monday, March 11, 2019. (PTI Photo) (PTI3_11_2019_000084B)
Some consumers, such as Rajini Venkatesh, are driven by their extremely sensitive skin to buy natural Holi colours. “I’ve been using them for over 10 years when awareness about such colours was not even there. Even if it says organic or herbal, I buy only if it has an ISI registered mark and number. Then I try a test patch on my wrist before I actually use it; you can tell if a colour is natural from the way it stains your skin,” she reiterates.
Skin care during Holi
Dr. Praveen Bhardwaj, consultant dermatologist at Apollo Clinic, Marathahalli, states that the most common complaints people come to him with soon after Holi is with mild allergies – in sensitive areas such as face and neck, behind the ears and in hand folds. Colours also tend to “sit” in the cracks of skin of the hands and feet – something to watch out for.
“If you have highly allergic or sensitive skin, stay away from colours. Creating a barrier on the skin by first applying petroleum jelly on the body, or sunscreen, is a good idea. Coconut oil also works, but because it is absorbed faster into the skin, it may need to be applied multiple times,” he says. He also suggests that you play for a short time with colours, and avoid dipping in public pools filled with liquid colours. “After playing, wash, but don’t scrub over-enthusiastically. That will harm your skin.”
