By Okram Bimol
IMPHAL, November 30: The past ten days have been a nightmare for anyone travelling anywhere near the Manipur Sangai Festival main venue. Traffic along the roads leading to Hafta Kangjeibung or on any other passing anywhere near the venue had remained congested and jammed for most time the past ten days.
The ten day long Manipur Sangai Festival with its name taken from the beautiful dancing deer ‘Sangai’ was inaugurated by the state Deputy Chief Minister Gaikhangam on November 21 amidst much fanfare.
The festival concluded today at the Bheigyachandra Open Air Theartre. The festival’s main aim was to bring out the best of Manipur before the world and attract as much tourist as it can. During the past ten days, the organizers had showcased the best of Manipur’s culture, traditions, folk dances of all communities, indigenous cuisine and music, adventure sports and natural beauties.
Though the ten days might have somewhat succeeded in promoting the state’s beauty up to a level, the traffic and security management remained much below the expectations of the public.
For starters, commuters find traffic along the Konung Mamang road that also acts as the main connectivity between Imphal East and West to be congested and jammed at most times during the ten days except at late in the night.
The congestion was mainly because of the road side parking of vehicles along the road.
Due to the non-availability of a regular parking lot for vehicles coming along the Konung Mamang road and from the Nongmeibung and New Checkon sides, people who were visiting the festival parked their vehicles along the road starting from Pureiromba Khongangkhong and continuing along the New Checkon road choking the road and as such creating undesirably long traffic snarls and jams along the road.
This happened even though the organizers had announced several parking lots including one at the Raja Dumbra School compound, Andro Parking. However, one can see parking spaces only at the Andro Parking.
Meanwhile, People also complained about overly tight security arrangement.
Visitors complained that though the security had to tighten due to last year’s bomb blast at the festival venue, the security arrangement was more than overtly tightened. The provision of only one entry points each for men and women and only one exit point also created quite a discomfort for the visitors who had to stand for long queues.
Meanwhile, the Thailand team lamented that this year’s festival was way below their expectations.
The team leader, Zarin Bhesania along with 10 others had arrived in the state for the festival.
The team leader said that her team was also there in the last year’s edition, and added that her team was very much satisfied with the festival.
She however added that this year’s edition was not satisfactory.
She complained that the stalls were much smaller than last years.
She expressed her belief that the next year’s edition will be far more interesting and satisfactory than this year.