Kites take festivities to new heights

The Vogue Institute of Fashion Technology recently held Sankranti Sambrama to celebrate the harvest festival in their own  traditional ways. Their Magrath Road campus was full of energy with girls walking around in saris and the boys wearing kurtas.

The event was inaugurated by B Dayanand, IPS, Joint Commissioner of Police, Crime (East) and TV anchor Sheetal Shetty, who judged the various competitions that the students participated in — from the fashion show to sugarcane eating.

As an art and design institute, they carefully adhered to the Sankranti theme with decorations like diyas, sugarcane sticks and kites lining the corridors. In one room, girls applied mehendi on each other’s hands, while in another, students were seen making rangolis.

Kites, which are specific to the festival, were also given a lot of importance. While some were decorated with hearts, others had intricate sequence work on them.

“It was wonderful making a kite. Mine showed phases of how people celebrate this festival by painting scenes of kite-flying and cutting sugarcane. It’s full of colour and happiness, just like the festival,” shares Pooja, a student.

The boys were excited while participating in the popular sugarcane eating competition.
“It was the most fun-filled event, though the whole day was nice in general. It’s something new for us because we wear Western dresses normally. Here, we got to dress in traditional attire. The significance of the festival was explained to us earlier to enjoy it better,” notes Kiran, who also participated in the fashion show.

Since pots play a major role during the festival, the students were given a chance to showcase their creativity by painting small pots with pretty colours and intricate designs.
Nisha Doshi, one of the participants in the competition says, “It was an awesome experience for me because it’s the first time I’m trying this. I tried to make them colourful for the festive mood and put kites and a lot of glitter.”

Since this is the first time, the festival is being celebrated in the college, the organising team was quite apprehensive. But, the response was better than they expected.
“We’ve been planning this for a month and it has turned out pretty well. We didn’t think that students would take it seriously and celebrate it with so much excitement,” wraps up Vardhini, a faculty member.