The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Visakhapatnam News : Visakha Utsav jinxed?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Dec 30, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Visakhapatnam

Visakha Utsav jinxed?

By Our Staff Reporter

VISAKHAPATNAM, DEC. 29. The death and devastation caused by the December 26 tsunami has cast its shadow over Visakha Utsav -- the annual tourism carnival of the district.

Before the catastrophe, a section of officials and mediapersons in the district were resisting the holding of the fiesta on January 13, 14 and 15 --Bhogi, Sankranti and Kanuma respectively -- public holidays.

With tsunami casting its shadow, the organisers have sought the Government's permission to reschedule the carnival, and the Minister for Commercial Taxes, Konathala Ramakrishna, has already hinted at its postponement.

Consultation

The district Collector and Visakha Utsav Organising Committee Chairman, Praveen Prakash, said on Wednesday that consultation with the authorities was on to fix new dates for the carnival.

The utsav, which was started in 1996 amid fanfare when Veena Ish was Collector, has turned jinxed due to cancellation of the event in 2002 and 2003 for a variety of reasons.

The original idea was to showcase the tourism potential of the region through a publicity blitzkrieg on Buddhist sites, picturesque locales and virgin beaches, lush-green Araku valley, Borra caves and coffee gardens in the agency tracts to boost revenue from domestic and overseas tourists and create confidence among investors for setting up ventures.

In 2002, the utsav was initially postponed and later cancelled due to preoccupation of the official machinery with the hosting of the National Games. The dissolution of the Assembly forced the officials to cancel the utsav in 2003. Instead of October or November of 2004, it was earlier announced that the utsav would be held in mid-January of 2005.

The proposal for holding the utsav either in October or November -- considered tourist season due to pleasant climatic conditions -- has still remained a far cry. Originally it was also proposed to evolve a format so that the utsav was made more attractive year after year.

There is also criticism that the utsav has more or less become a `jatara' of sorts with food joints putting up stalls doling out various dishes, deviating from the avowed objective of organising the utsav -- promotion of tourism potential of the area.

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