 |
| Tourists enjoy the rain dance during Rain Rock Festival in Sohra. A Telegraph pictur |
At the planet’s wettest place, it rained rock this weekend as Sohra hosted a two-day music festival as a tourism promotion event.
Organised by the Meghalaya government, the two-day rain rock festival in Sohra from February 20 was aimed at showcasing the uniqueness of the place for a possible World Heritage Site status. The festival was also aimed at exploring the tourism potential of Sohra.
“We enjoyed the rain dance conducted for the first time by the district administration,” said Rebecca, a youngster, who had come all the way from Nongpoh to attend the festival.
As this is not the monsoon, artificial rain was created by two fire tenders at Sai Mi Ka Park.
The sub-divisional officer of Sohra, Brahmadev Ram Tewari, said during the two-day festival inaugurated by chief minister Donkupar Roy, the rain dance, flower show, food court, and fashion show had attracted the crowd, both young and old.
Other attractions were the indigenous games such as archery, hiking, dancing competition and on the spot essay writing for the schoolchildren.
A rock concert by a band from Sohra and the dance performance by the students of National Institute of Fashion Technology, Shillong, also enthralled tourists who had come from Assam and other parts of India.
“This is a unique experience and we really enjoyed the event,” said Sanjay Saikia from Guwahati.
During the festival, the district administration had also sought the support of the people in its effort to declare Sohra as a national rain park and subsequently a natural heritage site.
Sohra has many records for rains to its credit. This include the highest rainfall in a day (1,563mm or 61 inches on June 16 1995), highest rainfall in a year (24,553mm or 966 inches in 1974) and highest rainfall in a calendar year (22,987mm during August 1860-July 1861).
It is a date with a difference. Dispur is busy marshalling its personnel and resources for the video conferencing Assam chief secretary P.C. Sharma will have with cabinet secretary K.M. Chandrasekhar on February 27 from the state secretariat.
The five-minute video conferencing will be on the status of the implementation of the economic stimulus announced by the Centre to limit the adverse impact of the global slowdown on the country. The Centre wants that the pace of the implementation of the schemes is expedited and video-conferencing is not only a cost-cutting, time-saving initiative, but also a way of getting personally connected at the click of the mouse.
Dispur understandably has made all preparations to ensure that everything passes off smoothly as senior officials of the Planning Commission and other departments like agriculture, health, education, telecommunications will be there to answer to the queries and any problem the state might be having while implementing the programme. The video conferencing is a follow-up of a meeting of chief secretaries held at Vigyan Bhawan by the Centre on January 31.
 |
| Majuli |
FOOTNOTE
It may sound incredible, but the residents of Majuli, one of the worst flood-affected areas in the region, are today crying for a drop of rain. With no rain for over four months now, the island has virtually turned into a sand desert making life miserable for the people.
It may sound incredible, but the residents of Majuli, one of the worst flood-affected areas in the region, are today crying for a drop of rain. With no rain for over four months now, the island has virtually turned into a sand desert making life miserable for the people.
“Continuous sandstorms during the day have made life a living hell for us. We are desperately waiting for a shower of relief,” the sub-divisional officer of Majuli, P.C. Deka, said.
Deka said many people have been suffering from respiratory diseases because of the sandstorms, which have become a major health hazard.
The SDO said there were reports of trees falling down because of the dry spell. The river has moved away around 2kmin some areas and there is sand all around, the official said.
Ironically, the island witnessed one of the worst floods last year with over 80 per cent of the landmass being submerged. Schools and government offices were closed down for over a week. Such was severity of the floods that it was decided to build government offices on raised platforms.
Punya Saikia, a resident of Kamalabari, said the island had never witnessed such a dry spell before, at least in the recent past.
“It feels like as if we are in a middle of a desert and one has to cover his face to brave the strong dusty wind,” Saikia said.