By Melarbor Lyngdoh
Festivals whether major or minor positively highlights our state in the nation as the music capital of India, helps the local economy, generates substantial amounts of revenue in terms ofman days in those days for which the excess amount made on these days can be saved with interest accrual or invested besides bring in domestic tourists from all over the country. Nevertheless, one cannot deny that there have been a lot of unfeigned complaints on social media and letters to the editor regarding these mega festivals which warrant addressal. My brain is wired to offer solutions or suggestions in any small capacity for any kind of problem. After reading all the issues pertaining to festivals, I have deduced the following Standard Operation Procedure (SOP) for all kinds of festivals so that they benefit the state.
Finance: The amount invested from the public exchequer must be extensively specified for which proposes the invested money will be spent in detail such as for set up, travelling, ticketing expenses and the like no matter how negligible or insignificant the amount spent for any specific purpose. The revenue earned deducted from invested amount must be explicitly stated. A booklet on all the festival types held in a calendar year must be produced by the tourism department with includes the intro of the festival, its bonafide purpose for holding it and all financial details of each and every festival in chapter wise appendix. The release of the festival booklet must be announced and released at the Shillong press club post financial year; every year. This must be the notified norm henceforth. In the newspaper, the balance sheet for all festivals consolidatively taken must be akin to a bank statement as displayed by the MR Bank and MCA Bank with the full balance sheet details for transparency and accountability. This is for all of those who are privy to have the Consolidated Tourism Festival Booklet Report.
Ticketing: Tickets sold to the public and those quota tickets reserved for politicians; bureaucrats and all types of their associates /chaperones / cohorts must be specified in percentage terms of the tickets that are reserved for them.
Traffic Protocol: Their arrangements especially for major festivals must be stated in the booklet so as to not cause any future accidents nor render inconvenience to the public. There must be a standard modus operandi for traffic regulation for the public and the VIPs.
Attire: The artist and their entourage must cover themselves not showing their private parts under any circumstances. They must respect the culture and customs of the state they are in just as they respect the culture and customs of Muslim nations where they went and perform. They must be advised in advance to dress decently.
Ethics: The artist(s), their entourage, their interaction amongst themselves and with the fans whether during performance on stage or off stage must be non-sexual in nature with no sexual insinuations and sexually deviant acts whatsoever as had been distastefully witnessed last year between an artist and a fan and this year between an artist with one his own performers. The artists and their entourage must never use cuss words on stage while talking or while performing. They must use an edited version of their songs or raps. They must exhibit morality to the people in this dominant Christian state with prior instructions being given to them for strict adherence.
Noise Decibels: The noise pollution emanating from major festivals must be adjusted in such a way so as to be heard only and within the stadium if such an adjustment can be made since it causes nuisance to all walks of life especially hospitals, the aged, the sickand the students.
Time Frame: Local artist/DJs should start their musical acts between 2 PM to 5.45 PM. The time for performance by major artists enlisted and promoted in the posters and media should be from 6 PM to 11 PM with extension to 11.10 PM on the last day only. Adherence is sacrosanct and inviolable.
A Balanced Approach would be that the government should host one Gospel concert every June and December featuring local and international artists from all over the world so that it will not be viewed as a worldly government glamorizing worldly music but also promoting spiritual music in this Christian state.
Revenue Spent: This is the most pertinent issue which has become a major bone of contention when it comes to festivals because the youth benefit nothing except for a short euphoria to negate their unemployment problems and lack of sanctioning of jobs in the departments severely lacking manpower and principally for the servicing departments forasmuch as the population increases these servicing departments require more manpower to cater to this ever-increasing population. A mandated specified percentage must be allotted and assigned from the total amount earned from holding all the festivals in a calendar year whereby the government deposits the money and accrues interest for holding the next year’s list of minor to major festivals. Most importantly, another specified percentage from the total revenue earned from all the festivals which must be substantial in nature when compared with the former, must be mandatorily invested for establishing businesses and enterprises for the educated unemployed youth so that they can be gainfully employed to make absolutely sure that they have viable, stable ,long term, lifelong careers by intensively launching existing and novel livelihood developmental programmes such as (i).Marketing of raw agriculture produce, all sorts of manufactured products, crafts, food processing either nationally and internationally such as with the SAARC and ASEAN nations by the state and central government so that our state can be an export state analogous to Bengal, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab on an aggressive intensified PPP mode, (ii).Establishing Novel Skill Intensive trainings, (iii). Enhancement on the existing yet simplistic Skilling Programmes which has been going on for more than one decade under DDU-GKY and other scheme types (iv). Training for setting up of micro, small and medium industries such as food processing like biscuits, creams, chips, powders, containers plus many other Livelihood programmes with the government taking the initiative by linking with the importers of other states to create an export foundational market base. CM Prime, CM Elevate, DIEC schemes, NRLM, NULM may be combined or respectively enhanced using this substantial specified allotted portion of this revenue earned from all festivals combined; for aggressively launching these self-employed livelihood programmes. Aside from these, the government can also help by reducing the loan repayment amount of central employment schemes when the youths take up since the loan repayment for these central employment ranges from 10 – 50 Lakhs for which loan repayment may be narrowed down via pro youth government intervention. Awareness generation of the different types of state and central self-employment schemes and skill training types has not been up to the mark in terms of reaching the unreached in rural areas which necessitates improvement. Hence revenue earned from festivals can be used to endeavour these hard-pressed matters. If the bulk of the revenue is not put back and paid forward by investment on young generation for self-employment, then these festivals have become “pain killers” for the youth to drown their sorrows through transient merriment (v). Local artists must be paid handsomely in those days for their performance to provide gainful employment for them as opposed to their current payments which are lacklustre.
Concurrence to the SOP points that I had put forth, this will help the government to curtail criticisms to a great extent which the government can further enhance to the current ones being advocated by me. My perception is that festivals have their own pros and cons but a balanced approach reassures the naysayers and yea-sayer to a considerable extent.
((The views of the writers are of his own and does not necessarily reflect that of Highland Post)
