Endless Festivals and Its Negative Impacts On The Economy Of Manipur

Juliet Wahengbam *

Manipur Sangai Tourism Festival 2013 : Opening day :: Pix - Arunkumar Thongam

Festival is a day or days of celebration of an organized series of cultural and social concerts or to remember an event to promote the cultural heritage of the society.

Manipur is land of festivals.

Some of the festivals we celebrate here are Cheiraoba, Ningol-Chakkouba, Yaoshang, Gaan-Ngai, Lui-Ngai-Ni, Ratha Jatra, Ramjan-Id, Kut, Heikru-Hidongba, Dipawali, Dussehra, Sangai Festival, Christmas, Lai Haraoba, New Year, etc. Each festival has a religious or mythological significance behind it and is celebrated with great pomp and show.

When any festival comes, we are very happy and prepare it well by white-washing as well as decorating our houses and putting on festive dresses. We pray to God/Goddess to guide us in the right path and to make us pure, good and prosperous.

However, in celebrating a festival, we, the people, spend a huge amount of money unnecessarily and on expensive things. Let's take some illustrations. In Manipur, there are many communities, and that's why she has a composite culture.

In any community's festival, the people jointly celebrate it with spending huge expenditure. People celebrated Ningol Chakkouba, Cheiraoba, New Year, Christmas, etc with great feasting, thus, leading to more leftover foods.

People present gifts in a luxurious way. During festival, the prices of essential goods are sky high. However, things are continuously bought. Children and their parents themselves also buy new and expensive clothes and things. Transportation and roaming of people during festivals lead to over exploitation of fuel.

Festivals also enhance the level of corruption. For instance, Sangai Festival is organised to attract tourists and to improve the socio-economic condition of the State, on the contrary, corrupted some people and there is no sign of any improvement in the socio-economic condition of the State and its people.

Festivals misguide the people as well. Say in Lai Haraoba also, many unrelated entertainments are added. Nowadays, Thabal Chongba is also organised frequently.

Apart from unnecessary expenditure, such unregulated festivities disturbed concentration in works resulting to the inability to achieve goals with concrete results.

All these numerous festivals in turn affect the economy, physical environment, psychology, political administration, etc. They greatly affect the poor and the students. Youths are the future of the society, if they are rotten seeds, the society will be underdeveloped economically and socially very weak.

We can rectify this evil practice by educating the people about the advantages and disadvantages of the festivals. Everyone should be a role model to eradicate this polluted system from our society. I would like to request the concerned department to ensure that the harmful impacts of festivals are also included in our school's syllabus.

Lastly, let us join hand to save our State from this dangerous life style and lead to a new height of moral, economy and spiritual glory.

Don't put off till tomorrow that you can do today. If we delay to eradicate this bad habit, we may fail in our struggle.