Kolkata, March 19 -- For the fifth consecutive year, the heritage 'Basanta Utsav' (spring festival) of Visva Bharati University, introduced by Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore over a century back, has plunged into uncertainty.
With only about a week left for the festival of colours, no meeting has been held by the varsity's Executive Committee about organising the Basanta Utsav, a university official said on Tuesday. The festival was last held in 2019. It used to be a grand affair with about one lakh people participating in it. Besides the ashramites, people from various places used to gather at Santiniketan to celebrate the festival. People used to smear each other with 'gulal' and celebrate by dancing to various Tagore songs. "As of now, there is a remote possibility of the university holding the festival on its own. Not a single meeting has taken place with the Birbhum district administration either," the official said.
"But we are mulling a much smaller festival of colours with regulated entry for ashramites and select invitees. It can be organised in an open ground on the campus after this year's Doljatra (March 25)," the official said. The spring festival or 'Basanta Utsav' was introduced by Tagore, who had founded Visva Bharati, in the early 1920s. It soon became a spontaneous vibrant festival of colours with the enthusiastic participation of students, residents of Santiniketan and others. During the past 20 years, the festival got bigger and turned into an important tourism event in the university town as all hotels and resorts used to get fully booked and traders got an opportunity to do brisk business. With agency inputs
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.