After Assam won the first prize in the children’s festival ‘Balrang’, held in December, 2008 at Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh, it was now the turn of Manipur to bag the first prize at Balrang-2009. The festival was organised jointly by the Indira Gandhi National Museum of Man, Bhopal and the Directorate of Public Instruction (DPI) of the Government of Madhya Pradesh. Besides informative and technical stalls set up by the students of different schools of Madhya Pradesh, a new feature was added this year by the Utkrisht School of Dewas – by its teacher, Rajkumar Chandan, and his student, Sapna Yadav, who created a rangoli, a colourful design, on the water surface instead of the floor, as is the usual practice. Sapna narrated that this art was prevalent during the Mahabharat era, too, but has since been neglected. The colours used are usually of carbon, as they neither dissolve in water, nor drown within it.

This Balrang held on December 19- 20, 2009, was started very enthusiastically by the students themselves in the forenoon of December 19, under the direction of the august personality of Kaushalendra Kumar Pande, Joint Direcor, and his team of officials of the DPI, without waiting for a formal inauguration by a political whip. Also, unseasonal rains necessited the shifting of the venue from its usual widespread area to the confines of Vithi Sankul, as the Museum’s prestigious auditorium is known, and in its surrounding buildings. The area of the festival was, thus reduced very much and temporary stages had to be put up to cope up with the heavy number of cultural events and programmes that were compressed mostly for the final day of December 20. The Museum authorities rose to the occasion by arranging the facilities for the show of the Education Department.

Amongst the cultural presentations, the Bihu dance of the Assam team was performed first on the stage of the Vithi Sankul, and earned heavy applause from the audience. Their cultural programme was followed by Mizoram, Manipur and other States in sequence, then by the Suha dance of Chhattisgarh and the Disi dance of Uttarakhand. The Naga dance, too, earned good applause from the audience. The Goan dance Dekhni, also attracted the attention of the gathering, who appreciated the physical skills of the performers in balancing and upholding the lamps on their heads under various dance postures.

A student, Reshma, from the Himachal Pradesh team, enlightened the audience about the presence of folk songs and dances in their culture, in which praises are offered to God. Samiksha, a dancer from the Goan team, was vocal in coming from the land earned from the sea by Lord Parshuram, when he threw his ace in the ocean, ordering its mighty waters to withdraw from the borders declared by his axe. Amina Chaudhury, the dance instructor of the Assam team, highlighted the love part as expressed in their Bihu dance, which is performed by all creeds and communities of Assam in different seasons throughout the year. She also praised the care and consideration the North East Indian teams received from the Museum authorities under the charge of DK Jain, assistant curator.

At the end of the function, it was the role of the Governor of Madhya Pradesh, Rameshwar Thakur, to give away the prizes which were announced in the reverse order, beginning from consolation prizes of certificate and Rs 1,000 only, as given to the teams of Mizoram and Assam, the third prize of Rs 7,000 was given to, the Himachal Pradesh team, the second prize of Rs 11,000 went to the Goa State team, and the first prize of Rs 15,000 was bagged by Manipur for their brilliant performance. This year, the Madhya Pradesh team was segregated from the all India teams, and the first prize to the teams from MP went to the Gwalior team. The prize distribution ceremony took place on the stage erected in the open ground near the Vithi Sankul, to accommodate the heavy attendance of the school children and staff members accompanying them, the spectators and the security police.

After the prize distribution, sample cultural presentations were performed on that stage before the Governor and the Hon Minister for Women and Child Development, Ranjana Baghel, who presided over the prize distribution ceremony. A handicapped child of eight years, Ankur Pandit from Gwalior in MP, danced to the tunes of a film song with such attractive and entertaining poses, that he was greeted by the audience with thundering clapping throughout his performance. When he ended his dance and was about to go down the stage, Ranjana Baghel, the presiding minister, was so overwhelmed by his childish pranks, that she got up from her seat and rushed to the child, lifting him in her arms, while waving her hand to the audience and showered motherly affection upon him.

In all, apart from the 70 school teams of MP, eleven other States participated in this all India school children cultural competition. This time, only four states of Assam – Mizoram, Nagaland and Manipur from the NE India took part. In all, more than 1,000 school children and their staff members participated in the festival. The responsibility for the NE States teams was borne by the Museum, under the care of Vikas Bhatt, its Director and that of the other states, including the MP team, was borne by the Directorate of Public Instructions, under the stewardship of BR Naidu, IAS, commissioner of the DPI.

In their brochure, released on the occasion, the festival is described as “dedicated to the children, by the children, for the children”. It is, therefore, only in the fitness of the above motto that the festival should also be inaugurated by the children, too, i.e., the top winners of the previous year could do this noble deed of inauguration of the festival in the Balrang to be presented. The Chief Minister and other Ministers of the State Government could stand by their side to clap and encourage the children with their speeches.

Tej Narayan