Karbi Youth Festival 2024: Golden Jubilee celebration, Dates announced, events, latest updates

Karbi Youth Festival is a well known cultural spectacle celebrated majestically in Assam. It is one of the oldest known tribal festival in Assam. It is a blend of culture mixed with traditional art forms, folk dance and music, indigenous trade activities and an outlay of tribal delicacies. The Karbis constitute a significant ethnic population in the state of Assam about second highest tribal population, the first being the Bodos. Assam has a separate district called Karbi Anglong which constitutes majority of Karbi population i.e 9,56,313 people including those in rural as well as in urban areas. The Karbi Youth festival is held annually in the month of February with fixed dates between 15-19 February.

Karbi Youth Festival– History:

The Karbis are an agro-based tribal community and therefore their cultural traits are interlinked with the agricultural activities. In the traditional Karbi Society, initiating from the first rainfall of the season, the Karbis commemorate every occasion with celebrations through singing and dancing.

The first celebration of the year begins with ‘Rongker’ where the first offering is made to God for the welfare of the tribe. Then the elderly inhabitants of ‘Rong-Arak’ which is the capital of Karbi religious King, perform the ‘Botor Kekur‘ with due consent from the Karbi King. It is a religious event where prayers are made to rain god, known as ‘Botor Alun’ for ample rainfall and proper harvest. In the course of seed-sowing, the Karbi youths perform a traditional dance which is known as ‘Ritnong Chingdi’.

At the end of the cultivation the young lads return to their respective dormitories called ‘Terank’. During this time they get trained on skilled work such as crafting of bamboo and wood while the young girls get trained on weaving and singing traditional songs. They celebrate this period of time by making merry and dancing ‘Henup Ahi Kekan’. During this period they also collect bamboo shoots and preserve it for the entire year. The completion of harvest is marked by dancing ‘Hacha Kekan’ which is followed by husking dance ‘Lengpum Sokchon’.

The Karbi Youth Festival is an event to preserve all of these traditional dance forms and cultural activities. The origin of the festival can be traced to 1974 with the formation of Karbi Zonal Youth Festival Committee by Roy Enghi. Later in 1977, the Karbi Cultural Society was formed and the entire event came to be celebrated officially. Since then every year Karbi Youth Festival is being celebrated in a grand manner at Karbi People’s Hall, Taralangso, Diphu, Karbi Anglong.

Karbi Youth Festival 2024: Events

In the year 2024, the Karbi Youth Festival will complete its 50 glorious years of celebration. On the occasion, there are several proposed events lined up. These are:

• Due to the upcoming Lok Sabha Elections in 2024, the Karbi Youth Festival, KYF has been pre-poned and it will be celebrated on 12 January, 2024 to 19 January, 2024 instead of 15-19 February.
• The Karbi Youth Festival 2024 in its golden jubilee celebration has proposed to invite President of India Smt Droupadi Murmu as Chief Guest to grace the occasion. The President of India will also inaugurate the grand celebration.
• As a part of the mega event, the Karbi Cultural Society has decided to move one step further by creating a Guinness World Record of ‘Kengdongdang Kedam’, a traditional sport of Karbi community, to walk with bamboo poles. This event will witness a record participation of more than 30,000 youths from their community.
• The inaugural ceremony will be followed by a ‘Kanbarim’, a traditional dance form of the Karbis, with a huge participation of more than 5,000 dancers comprising of both male and female.

Frequently Asked Questions on Karbi Youth Festival FAQs:

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