Festival Fiasco - the downside of Festivals in Vizag
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Festival Fiasco - the down side of festivals in Vizag
Festival fiasco
Sohan
Hatangadi
Appeared 6 September 2015
Vizagites have been traditionally celebrating
festivals such as Sankaranthi, Shiva Ratri, Vinayaka Chatruthi for several
years with great enthusiasm. Festivals are a time for rejoicing and connecting
with our roots. We have a cosmopolitan population and it is natural that
certain festivals like Holi, Deepavali and Durga Puja normally ethnic to
communities from different parts of India have been adapted by locals and
gained in popularity in recent years. With cultural diversity festival
traditions pass on from one community to another and in the process the way the
festival is celebrated goes through change giving it a local flavor and
relevance.
Private
limited to public unlimited
In Vizag’s earlier years a few well organized
functions would cater to a large number of people from all over the town.
Serious purohits would recite the mantras and conduct the proceedings for the
entire duration of the festival. Families would visit the pandals dressed in
their fineries, pray at the venue, collect their prasadam, make a modest
donation in the hundi and some would stay to watch the cultural programme in
the evening. Some festivals were a family affair; they were practiced in a
small personal and modest way with family and friends. Soon these occasions
become larger and larger. In recent times it has transmuted from a personal,
family or community ritual to an epic extravaganza.
The age
of enterprise
Some enterprising youngsters discovered that with
a minimum investment of printing a receipt book and going around in groups they
could collect enough money to put buy a Plaster of Paris (POP) idol, erect a rented
pandal on the street, lay out a few plastic chairs and rent the loudest public
address system from which they forcefully entertain their neighborhood 24 hours
non-stop with the latest item number songs accompanied with suggestive heaving
and panting sounds quite inappropriate to the occasion. Soon every local cultural
club, auto-rickshaw stand and miscellaneous unions and societies was in the
business. At the end of the festival after these pandals have inflicted
themselves upon the neighborhood, they open their hundi box and distribute the spoils
among themselves. Due to the large numbers of organisers involved in the mini enterprise
the fund sharing phase generally ended up in acrimony and brawls spawning even
more pandals next year.
Immodest
immersions
Almost every large festival results in pollution
of different types. As is the practice all over India, idols must be immersed
in a water body at the end of the festival. The idols are generally carried by
trucks, carts, on shoulders or by hand depending on how large the idol is. There
was a time when Vinayakas were little handmade mud or clay pieces placed on a betel
leaf and worshipped. Now since POP idols can be mass manufactured and painted
with the most garish lead based paints their capacity to impact their
environment has multiplied thousand fold. Every year the idols get bigger and
more in numbers. As we Vizagites have a sea every idol large and small ends up in
our sea along with the various plastic paraphernalia that comes with the
pandal. Unfortunately all the idols that get dumped into the sea land right
back on our beach. For the next few days an army of cleaners and hundreds of
trucks are deployed to clean up our beaches.
Shock
& awe
With the proliferation of pandals, there is a
pandal or two or three in every neighborhood. Every pandal can afford to rent
microphones, music systems, powerful amplifiers and speakers the size of small
houses. They start with an hour of “hella
… hella … mike testing … 123…”, then bombard the hapless local residents
from morning to night with a combination of chanting prayers, lewd film music
and – heaven forbid –some local talent who brays tunelessly all evening. Fortunately
the day arrives when the circus has to move to the beach. The pandal is carried
on trucks, trailers, mini vans or flat rickshaws accompanied by the entire
sound system to the beach from early evening till the wee hours of the morning.
Along the way the pious youth blast the road side apartments with 10,000 watts
of disco music, drunken screams and a display of horrid gyrating dances that make
the Gods tremble with shock and awe.
Glory to
plastic
Prasadams is a big part of festivals. Some people
must believe that as per our ancient texts prasadams can only be served in plastic
bowls and water in plastic sachets. The devotees must then toss these plastic
containers and water sachets on the ground or the nearest drain as a part of
the ritual. These plastics must remain on earth till the end of the plasti-kali-yuga
when the earth ends or till the GVMC sweepers come and carry it all away.
Karthik
masam and Giri Pradakshina
The emperor of pollution is Karthik Masam which
is celebrated in November. From celebrating our natural God given environment
it has become a celebration of plastic cups, sachets, Styrofoam and foil
laminated plates. The problem is that the same picnic spots that attract
Vizagites because of its quiet green beauty become a spot for drunken revelry
and an ugly dumping ground for non-biodegradable waste. The crown prince of
pollution and vying for 1st spot is Vizag’s “Giri Pradakshina”, the
devotional walk around the Simhachalam hill has now become a mega event. It is
obvious that this long journey will leave the walkers thirsty. Well-meaning
social bodies provide drinking water in sachets to these walkers who then leave
a 35 kilometer long trail of ankle deep plastic sachets on the road. Those
well-meaning social organizations while supplying the sachets did not feel
necessary to also provide bins to collect the empty sachets and help GVMC with
their clearing efforts.
What’s your
problem?
One may as well ask why we should be concerned
about these religious festivals. After all India has always been a society that
exults in religious freedom. The problem is that everyone has a right to do
their own thing as long as it does not impact others adversely. We are ok with
some inconvenience but for God’s sake don’t overdo it and kill Vizag. Due to
our innate copycat nature every festival just grows larger and larger. Giri
Pradakshina devotees will grow from 3 lakhs to 10 lakhs soon. Last year 200
police personnel were employed for crowd control, next year we will need a
1,000. Most festivals obstruct traffic, cause unnecessary sound pollution and
mess up our city and our beach. Cleaning up the mess and keeping law and order is
paid for by our tax money. Money that could be better spent on tangible things
like maintaining our heritage sites, providing public amenities, repairing
government schools and so on.
So what’s
the solution?
Behavioral modification is not easy. Someone in
authority has to show steely resolve. Here are a few things that can be done. Every
pandal must be licensed by GVMC and levy a steep license fee. This will reduce the numbers by 50%. Pandals
must use organic prasadam containers made of adda leaves. All pandals must be
obliged to have large litter bins. Loud speakers with amplifiers above 15 watts
must be banned. The POP idol makers generally from other states set up camp
everywhere in Vizag to make the idols, they must be sent packing. During
Karthik Vanam, GVMC officials assisted by NGO volunteers must be deployed in
every picnic spot and insist that all containers (including the booze bottles) that
were brought for the picnic are taken back. The Giri Pradakshina event must
become plastic free, adequate drinking water tanks with non-contact drinking faucets
must be used instead of plastic water sachets. Most importantly a tough new
attitude must be displayed by the authorities. This will certainly change the
way these festivals are conducted and clean up our act. After all, cleanliness
is next to Godliness.
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