Adivasi Mela
The Adivasi Mela a.k.a. Bhubaneswar Tribal Exhibition is an annual event held in the Adivasi exhibition ground, from 26th January for 10 days in Bhubaneswar, India. This is considered as the oldest and the most colorful festival of tribal people where all the 62 tribes people including 13 PTGs, come over to the exhibition ground & spread out their ethnic mosaic. [1] [2]
Major Attractions[edit]
This old and colorful celebration showcases the workmanship, antiquities, culture, custom, and music of the tribal communities of Orissa. The Adivasi exhibition is the just a single of its sort in the nation. The stalls at the Adivasi mela shows and offers different handicraft items made by these tribal people. Various social, music and dance programs are also conducted as a part of this fair. Different selective booths show and offer indigenous innate items and different painstaking work things made by the ancestral networks. Various exclusive kiosks display and sell indigenous tribal products and various handicrafts items made by the tribal communities. Products like badis, turmeric, honey, tamarind paste, pulses and cereals like black gram, kandula, mustard, cumin seed, cinnamon and a large variety of rice are quite popular in the fair.[3] [4]
The food stalls at the fair stacked with mouth-watering stuff are also the crowd pullers. People are seen relishing a number of delicacies. Apart from local dishes, visitors also get ample opportunity to taste cuisines from other parts of the state like mutton curry and puffed rice (mudhi-mansa) from Mayurbhanj district.
Tribal Culture[edit]
The tribal people of Orissa are strong, industrious and very hospitable in nature. They usually don’t intermingle with outsiders, since they are not too advanced and are quite shy. These people express their cultural identity and distinctiveness in their social organization, language, rituals and festivals and also in their dress, ornamentation, art and craft. The tribal culture of Orissa is abundant in the celebration of various festivals including Adivasi Mela. The mela showcases the art, artifacts, culture, tradition, and music of the tribal people of Odisha. The festival is celebrated with much excitement and a number of cultural programmes showcasing dance and music of several tribal groups are held. The different customs and lifestyle of tribal culture is what makes the Adivasi Mela truly distinctive and fascinating. [5] [6]