Dussera is a festival celebrated in many forms. It's a celebration of the victory of good or evil, after nine days of Navratri. My grandmother tells me that Navratri is in honour of a nine day battle between a rakshas and a goddess (I've forgotten the names of both). At the end of the battle, the Goddess won, obviously, and we celebrate Dussera. It's also the day that effigies of Ravan are burned, again as a symbolic victory of Good over Evil. Though the only thing we do in my family, which I find most relevant, is the cleaning and worship of the tools of your trade. On this day people clean their houses, and their everyday working tools such as their computers, vehicles, typewriters, kitchens, etc. It is a day for remembering and respecting the tools that help in earning your livelihood. I enjoy doing this, and respecting my laptop comes very naturally since I would definitely die without it :)

A picture of a well decorated cycle; even a week after Dussera, most of the decorations are still visible in and around Pondicherry: