Kite Festival in Ahmedabad

The Kite Festival is one of the famous and popular festivals and events in Ahmedabad . It is held every year on January 14 to coincide with the festival of Uttarayan or Makar Sankranti . The day is characteristically marked by bright sun, clear skies, and breezes strong enough to lift innumerable kites high onto the clouds. With the summer sweltering still to come, the event marks an end of the winter. The Kite Festival in Ahmedabad is celebrated by innumerable people all over Gujarat, with Ahmedabad and Baroda becoming through years the cities of kite-fliers. With all work forgotten and cares put aside for the next day, all people rush to watch the magnificent spectacle. Special foods are prepared to cherish the occasion and eaten in the open fields and parks. Not even for a moment are the kites forgotten. With the festival marking the movement of the sun into northern hemisphere, it is time for the sleeping gods to wake from their long six-month long sleep and open up the portals of heaven. Millions throng the temples and alms are distributed freely.

The preparation for the day of Kite Festival in Ahmedabad starts a few days in advance with the kids and youth preparing their special kites and strings for the annual occasion. Kite flying starts at dawn and continues without a pause throughout the day. Friends, neighbors, and total strangers battle each other for supremacy and cries of Kapyo Chhey can be heard in a million voices. Cries of triumph render the air as someone cuts a rival's lines. With the tremendous varieties of kites reigning on the sky, a connoisseur has just to pick and choose. The kite strings are prepared specially to facilitate cutting and to prevent it getting cut. Special mixtures of glue and ground glass used to cover the lines, which are then dried and rolled into reers known as firkees . The nights experience illuminated box kites, often many of them strung on one line, launched to the skies. These things called tukkals , add a touch of splendor to the pitch-dark skies. Today the Kite Festival in Ahmedabad draws visitors from all over the world.

A visit to Ahmedabad during the festival will reward you a vision of the sky dotted with millions of colorful kites, a sight to remain in your mind for a long time.