Rajgir, Nov. 28: Curtains today went up on the 15-day-long Rajgir Mahotsav to celebrate the rich culture and tradition of the ancient hill city.
The mahotsav site is exactly on the mound developed over the fort, where Haryanka dynasty king Ajatshatru had held his father Bimbisar captive at Rajgriha (present day Rajgir) in the BC 6th century, 2,600 years ago. It is now known as the Quila Maidan.
Chief minister Nitish Kumar, who holds a special place for Rajgir in his heart, inaugurated the annual cultural and musical fiesta. It is his deep attachment with the hill city that Nitish today announced a plethora of ambitious projects for Rajgir, including a world-class sports academy, a film and an IT cities. Nitish also laid the foundation stone of a modern cabin-type ropeway at the historic Ratnagiri hills under the Pant Wildlife Sanctuary at Rajgir.
Nitish arrived in Rajgir a day before the inaugural event of the mahotsav. He will spend the next two days here. It is in pursuance of Nitish's wish only that the annual Rajgir Mahotsav has been made a 15-day event, which earlier used to be held only for three days. Last year, Nitish's predecessor Jitan Ram Manjhi, who has now sided with the BJP as an alliance member of the NDA, had held Rajgir Mahotsav as a 17-day event.
The event has been pre-poned this time to end-November against its earlier end-December schedule till previous year. The basic idea was to attract higher footfall by avoiding the inclement cold weather around end-December. However, the footfall at Quila Maidan on the inaugural day did not seem encouraging. Not a single foreign tourist could be spotted at the mahotsav venue and most visitors were local residents of Rajgir and Nalanda district.
Ashok Singh, a farmer from Lakhisarai, was one among the few outsiders. "I believe more people from outside Nalanda or even from other states can come if proper publicity is done for it," he said.
"Only local people from Rajgir or government officials and politicians have been coming to this mahotsav year after year. I am a resident of Rajgir and have been coming to the fair almost every year but I have rarely seen foreign tourists here," said Pushpanjali Pandey, an English teacher at a Rajgir-based private school.
Nitish, in his speech, too iterated the need for increasing the number of tourists at Rajgir. "The basic idea behind organising mahotsav and extending it to 15 days is to increase the number of tourists coming to Rajgir. The state government is committed to work on all fronts to make this place tourist-friendly," said Nitish.
The inaugural event on Saturday started with Nitish lighting the traditional lamp followed by the welcome speech by principal tourism secretary Harjot Kaur. Dignitaries sharing the dais with Nitish included tourism minister Anita Kumari, energy minister Bijendra Prasad Yadav and Nalanda MP Kaushalendra Kumar.
