All set for Basant festival in Punjab today
Pakistan Times Staff Report

LAHORE: Lahorites are all set to fly colourful kites and light up the skies here Saturday evening and Sunday to celebrate the seasonal festival of basant.

Basant, the festival of colours and kites, has helped Lahore in attaining a very respectable place on the world cultural map in recent years.

The people of Punjab, especially Lahorites, have always been fond of kite-flying and even in other towns of Pakistan has been on the rise.

According to a Punjabi maxim, ‘Aayi basant, pala urant’, basant marks the end of cold weather and chilly winds, even as mustard flowers blossom in the fields of Punjab here and parts of neighbouring India.

However, basant has never been as spendthrift an event as we now observe. Kites worth millions of rupees are sold, purchased and flown by the Lahorites during this 36-hour activity.

In addition to kite-flying, the festival features include other activities like music, throwing of basant parties by the affluent and upper middle class Lahorites, and wearing of yellow clothes.

Basant festivity is no longer restricted to the walled city and old localities like Islampura, Sanda, Samanabad, Mozang, Ichhra, Misri Shah, Shad Bagh, Baghbanpura and Wassanpura, now it has expanded in each and every part of the city.

Apart from the Lahorites, thousands of people from other parts of the country pour into the city to celebrate basant at private residences, with their relatives and friends.

This year, Pakistan Railways has run a number of special trains to facilitate basant revellers from other parts of the country.

Besides, hundreds of people from other countries are also arriving in Lahore to participate in this spring gala.

Basant is no longer a social or cultural activity only. It is now a festival with strong economic dimensions. The sale of kites, ranging from miniature guddi to king size guddas, brings phenomenal gains to the kite-makers, manufacturers of twine and other accessories. Mochi Gate becomes a big market of kites months ahead of the Basant festival.

The arrival of thousands of foreign and domestic tourists in the provincial capital provides an opportunity to the traders to take benefit from the Basant bonanza.

“Like Eid, Basant shopping generates a lot of rush in Anarkali bazaars and at other business centres,” says Sheikh Muhammad Asif, a trader at Anarkali.

Lately, Multinational companies (MNCs) have started capitalizing on the marketing opportunities provided by this festival by incorporating promotion of their products into various activities associated with basant such as sponsoring musical basant nights, displaying banners holding exclusive roof top functions for their special clientele etc.

Apart from MNCs, local companies have also tapped into the promotional opportunity and have added basant colours to their hoardings and billboards flaunted at several central locations in the city.

Alongside the traditional thrill, Basant festivity also brings illfortune to the people in the form of accidents caused by the use of chemical coated twine, nylon cord and metallic wire for flying kites.

Frequent power breakdowns add to people’s misery, besides causing heavy loss to Wapda. The use of prohibited forms of twine not only lead to injuries but also lead to electrocution of the people.

Lahore Electric Supply Company, City District Government Lahore and Police have constituted more than 100 teams to check the use of metallic wire and firing by basant revellers.●