 |
 |
|
|
|
|
Colourful Desert Festival
Draws Tourists in Jaisalmer JAISALMER: Traditional dances, colourful costumes, folk music and unique competitions marked the perfect ambience for a flamboyant desert festival witnessed by hundreds of tourists from across the country and abroad. The annual desert festival in Jaisalmer, about 450 km from Jaipur, has it all and much more. The three-day festival, which wound up on Monday, drew as usual a large number of visitors - tourists and locals alike. A colourful dance and acrobatic feats by camels was the high-point of the last day. Last year's festival was scaled down because of the India-Pakistan border tension - Jaisalmer is a frontline district - but it has been boosted this year with new events such as the camel race in the dunes, to bring the tourists back. Now the local maharaja and the tourism industry hope the end of the military face-off and a revamped festival will woo the tourists back. On the closing day, the festival attracted a diverse crowd, from UN health workers based in Geneva to village women in bright red and orange saris, with scarves covering their faces, to turbaned desert tribes people. It celebrates the culture and history of a tough desert State where summer temperatures pass 55 degrees Celsius (131 F), with traditional music, dance, food and offbeat events such as a turban-tying contest for foreign tourists and a camel dance. The Desert Festival has been an annual tourism promotional affair since 1979 and draws huge crowds from across the world. It is part of the numerous tourism festivals held to promote the desert belt as a tourist destination. The festival also aims to preserve historical monuments and local culture of Rajasthan, a princely State dotted with forts, palaces and lakes. A hit with foreign tourists, the desert festival has been described as a symphony in the Golden city, a name that Jaisalmer draws from the local yellow stones used in most of its buildings. -ANI |
|