Another belief that prevails in the society says that at the time of worship and performing religious rituals, whatever offerings we offer to the deities, should satisfy their senses i.e. deities must enjoy by seeing, smiling, touching, tasting or listening to our offerings.

For example - if we offer the apple to deities, then it should be full, round, red-yellow, fragrant, and clean and its shape should also be proper. It shouldn't be rotten. It means it is worthwhile to decide before offering any item to the deities that the offering is totally pleasing to their five senses.

The association of menstruation comes in picture here that during this natural cycle a certain type of odour is produced which most humans will not stand long. (Since this odour is produced from the disinfected by-products released by the body, funk is the resultant). And it is natural that the sensation of pleasure or satisfaction is not obtained from the funk. And when this bad odour joins the offerings, the offering doesn't remain worthy of presenting to the deities.

But the same question arises once again, whether the woman purposely produces odour in this way. No! the funk is produced by body-generated contaminated substances which are produced by the vital activities or Pranic Kriya. So in the process in which the act of divinised vitalities gets involved, how can it become a cause of inauspiciousness or ‘ashubhta'.

Some women and intellectuals may see the aforementioned opinion disastrous, for which I am apologetic, but this opinion is in vogue, so it seemed logical to me to mention it here.

There are communities in this world in which menstrual periods have been termed as sin and the women are kept in isolation. The woman of today's modern age may find it extreme, but it can be seen in such a way that energy is transferred from the ‘act of touch'. You might have observed that there is a trend of creating particular hand-stances during Yoga, Worship and while chanting mantras during ‘Homam', the fire ritual. Some fingers are touched to one another in a particular stance. The objective is to transmit and speed up the energy.

During the cycle of menstruation, there is a flow of feminine powers in the body and consciousness of the woman. In such a situation, touching others can reveal an unknown sensitive experience for them. Or at this time, touching a woman may also result in depletion of the vitalities. Probably due to this reason touching is not permissible for females during menstruation.

A famous legend from of ancient epic ‘Mahabharata', in which a woman was tortured by forcefully touching her at the time of imbalance of her vital energies, that is, at the time of menstruation. This illustration shows how abusing the divine power of a woman can force the whole community to face the consequences.

This parable tells the story of the misery and the violent end of Duryodhan & Dushasan and the entire race. This is because Dushasan not only touched Draupadi during her menstrual cycle, but mistreated her by attempting to nude her.

Although in this tale, it is not clearly stated that Draupadi was passing through the menstrual cycle at that time, but it can be assumed that Dushasan had brought Draupadi from a ‘solitary cell' and at that time Draupadi's hairs were ‘not tied' too. Both of these stages are customarily pointing to women's menstrual cycle.

Since that moment of mischievousness, Draupadi decided to keep her hairs open. She filled with pain and proclaimed this - "Dushasan! After your bleeding death only, I will tie my hair". Probably it was the sign of bleeding caused during menstruation.

It can be interpreted as:

After the death (exhaling process) of Dushasan (the contaminated substance), Draupadi (the woman) will get her hairs washed and tied (she will be purified again).