
Morung Express News
Dimapur | December 6
December 7 is the last day of the Hornbill Festival. So as you take the steps up the ‘Bamboo stall’ at the Naga Heritage Village, look to your left and you will see a garbage enclosure of the much-hyped festival at Kisama, right there – yes, out in open in full view.
The familiar stench of burning plastic sweeps across your nose and yes, even IMFL bottles thrown around the place. Walking higher up to the stalls serving indigenous food, the site is no better. Discarded food, empty mineral water bottles, paper cups and plates thrown in the open could spoil your appetite. Dumped mostly at the rear of food stalls, many visitors are probably not aware where their waste is going. Except for a few carton boxes provided for throwing garbage, there is not a single dustbin around the venue of the festival. It is therefore not surprising to see so many potato chips, sweet and ‘pan masala’ wrappers scattered everywhere, not to mention of garbage areas in most unlikely places.
A food stall worker said they were required to deposit the garbage ‘at a certain place’ but refused to point it out. Another food stall worker who had a garbage pile just below her stall, said they were not provided with dustbins, so they are compelled to throw it in the open. And oblivious to the unhygienic environment the food stalls maintain, these people are just here to earn their extra cash.
“Yes I noticed the garbage in some places and it is not a good sight,” a lady visitor said and added the liquor bottles “just shows how the organizers can never curb prohibited items during the festival.” A young visitor also said the neatly-trimmed grass and wonderful indigenous structures would look more beautiful if cleanliness was at all maintained.
The Hornbill Festival also happens to be the right place if you have a taste for wild, exotic and yes, even endangered wild animal meat. A boldly typed-out menu directed visitors to a food stall where these delicacies were being served. Despite the ban on sale of wild animals in the market and the awareness drive across the state to preserve wildlife, it is extremely interesting that no official of the concerned department or the organizers have questioned or banned such business as yet.