Karnataka - Madikeri   

Madikeri Dasara leaves bitter memories for local people

careless: Plastic waste strewn around at the Gandhi Maidan in Madikeri.

Madikeri: The Dasara celebrations in Madikeri has caused consternation among a section of the local people.

The Gandhi Maidan area where stage and cultural functions were organised on Tuesday, the last day of the Madikeri Dasara, is littered with plastic and other wastes.

The Mahatma Gandhi Road (Raja Seat road) has a trail of plastic bottles, sachets, cups and other items, all non-biodegradable. Places that attracted a large number of people during the celebrations have become an eyesore.

Will it serve the cause of the Madikeri City Municipal Council (CMC), which is advocating a plastic-free Madikeri, Roopa, who had come from Murnad to witness the Dasara celebrations asked.

Some of the mantaps that took the bedecked chariots had blocked the roads passing through the temples two days before the Vijayadashami day. The police remained mute spectators.

This had proved irksome to many who had to take circuitous routes to reach various locations in the city. “Who gave them permission to block roads two days in advance,” asked a local merchant. His business had suffered. Roads leading to a few temples had remained blocked even a day after the celebrations concluded.

Although the traffic police had imposed restrictions on vehicles entering the city after 4 p.m. on Monday, private buses and KSRTC buses could not enter their respective stands as decorated chariots had blocked the way even till Tuesday noon.

There were traffic jams when the mantaps returned to the respective temples after the procession. A provision should be made to make all mantaps to converge on a single place, says Nanaiah, a resident of Madikeri. Almost all business and commercial establishments made hay when the “sun was shining”.

Harish and four other friends who had come in a vehicle to witness Madikeri Dasara from Bangalore were heard complaining that the hotels fleeced them. “We are surprised to know that Madikeri has become so expensive,” Mr. Harish said.

Ordinary chrysanthemum flowers cost Rs. 40 to Rs. 50 a metre in the city on the Ayudha Puja day and Vijayadashami day.

The other irksome factor for many households was the donations collected by members of the temples from where chariots were being taken out.

“Why should we pay them when the State Government gives grants?,” asked Thangamma, an elderly resident of the city.

And, there were rains throughout the day and night, barring small let ups. Mantaps, some formed on the decks of five to six tractors, moved along precariously all along the road at the risk of touching the live electric wires.

Roads that were patched up for the mantap movements a couple of days before the Vijayadashami, had come off in the incessant rains.

The fear of spread of A(H1N1) influenza also was there, especially in view of the heavy influx into the city from outside, but it was not taken seriously by the surging crowd.

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