"In fact, for tam-brams the festival remains incomplete if we don't celebrate it with Golus - the age old way," says Mr. Subramanian. V, an Engineer from Mumbai who has been following this tradition for the past 15 years.

But before we get to the details of how to innovate your Golus for the coming Navratri, here is a brief look into how the tradition came about and what it signifies.

What is Golu?

Golu or Kollu is basically the artistic display of dolls during the festival of Navratri. According to the Hindu mythology, the dolls represent the assembly of Goddess Durga. This assembly is held right before the goddess sets out to kill the demon Mahishasura.

The Golu dolls are arranged on stairs made from wood. The number of steps depends upon the availability of dolls and of course the time required to create the arrangement.

According to the tradition the steps can be in odd numbers such as 3, 5, 7, 9 and above.

"A nine step Golu is what most families would consider the maximum," informs Mr. Subramanian.

This is because of lack of space and time. Plus, Navratri is for nine days, so people go for nine step ones signifying the essence of the festival.

However, the number is not restricted to nine alone. You can keep adding steps in odd numbers.

"Since the bigger ones require immense amount of time and patience to be created and maintained during those nine days, nine steps and above Golus are usually found in temples or in community halls," continues Mr. Subramanian.

Significance of the Number of Steps

The odd numbered steps come from the fact that Hindus traditionally believe in the power of odd numbers and consider them to be complete over an even number. That is the reason why when we do money offerings the denominations are always odd.

Apart from that the number of steps that we keep also signifies the prosperity of your family.

"So once you have increased the number of steps, it is considered inauspicious to reduce the steps next time. The more steps you add signifies that God has bestowed you with prosperity, a reduction would indicate impoverishment," explains Mr. Subramanian.