Festivals in India

This vivid cultural gathering, which brings together the 17 major tribes of Nagaland as well as many others from surrounding ‘sister’ states including Assam, Manipur, and Mizoram, draws around 200,000 visitors over 10 days. Yet both the festival and Nagaland itself remain firmly off the international tourist’s beaten track.

“I think for a lot of people the Hornbill Festival is an eye opener as to how diverse India really is,” says Rahul Aggarwal, founder of our partner Travel the Unknown, who arrange our trips to the festival. “We don't sugarcoat it – you’ve got a seven-hour, bumpy road journey to get there. But once you get there, you're going to see something that very few others do.”

Nagaland is known as the ‘land of festivals’ – with 17 major tribal groups, every month has an event, usually related to agriculture. The Khiamniungan people celebrate Miu when they sow their crops, offering prayers for the harvest. Meanwhile the Rengma mark the end of the harvest by coming together for feasting, singing and dancing at the Ngada Festival.

But the Hornbill Festival, held 1-10 December, is different. It is called the ‘festival of festivals’, with all of the Naga tribes in attendance. The aim is to encourage interaction between different ethnic groups, many of whom never meet each other otherwise, and to promote Nagaland’s unique cultural traditions. For the visitor, it is an opportunity to see and experience ways of life that may soon disappear.

Animist religions are on the wane in Nagaland, which is now largely Christian due to missionary work but 50 to 60 years ago it would have been very different. Historically Nagaland was known for its headhunting, too – the practise was only outlawed in the 1960s. At the Hornbill Festival you might see elderly members of the Konyak tribe, who tattooed their faces whenever they took the head of a victim. “Most are 80-plus and so it won’t be long before we can’t see these tattoos and styles of dress anymore,” says Rahul. Old traditions are dying out, but the Hornbill Festival is a chance for them to be preserved and, perhaps, for younger generations to take them up. Not the headhunting, though.

Tribesmen sport armour and sharp-tipped spears, and headdresses decorated with (usually artificial) hornbill feathers. There are displays of archery and wrestling, wood carving and sculpture. Stalls sell herbal medicine, and fierce Naga chilli peppers. An amphitheatre hosts music performances and dances punctuated by war cries. You can explore a village of morungs, traditional communal homes where tribespeople gather around the hearth to talk and eat.

“We have very good local guides who accompany you and help explain some of the nuances,” says Rahul. “When someone knowledgeable starts picking out the motifs on a tribal design and explains why it's this way, you understand the significance. The same with a particular sort of dance and what it's supposed to represent. Only a guide from that region can really explain it.”

Nagaland and the Hornbill Festival are a fascinating complement to neighbouring Assam, with its tea plantations, and the one-horned rhinos of Kaziranga National Park. “India is a very diverse country, but Nagaland is kind of obscure, and you’re typically not going to get your first time traveller going” says Rahul, “But it feeds into the responsible tourism ethos to bring travellers to a region that otherwise sees very few visitors.”

The Binsar Birding Festival is a springtime event organised by our partner, the award-winning Village Ways. Co-founder Manisha Pande wanted to build on their successful model of community-based tourism. They had already revitalised a quintet of villages within the Binsar Wildlife Sanctuary, helping to develop low-key travel experiences that take place alongside traditional farming, in harmony with local life rather than disrupting it.

The Binsar festival was a natural progression, says Manisha. “We knew people came here for bird watching, and we also wanted a way to help villagers sell their produce, such as from their small herb gardens, and their handicrafts.” Besides hikes in the reserve, there are wildlife film screenings, expert-led talks on subjects such as bird photography, and the local children take part in a painting competition. “A big highlight people always mention is the informal interaction with local villagers. You may be invited a wedding, you may go to market: every day could be a surprise.”

Once the summer capital of kings, Binsar lies in the Kumaon hills of Uttarakhand. This north India state was the birthplace of the female-led Chipko environmental movement that fought deforestation and logging, and in doing so gave us the term ‘tree huggers’. The wildlife sanctuary, established to protect broadleaf oak forest, is home to some 200 bird species, including several types of eagle, plum-headed parakeets, woodpeckers, forktails and giant Himalayan vultures, black kites, magpies, nightjars and warblers. Not to mention langur monkeys, goat-like gorals and even leopards. The birds help to scatter seeds and pollinate, and so are vital to the forest’s health, while also making this one of the best bird watching destinations in northern India.

The sanctuary has led to some friction, though. “When the forest was given protection, it caused many villagers living within the sanctuary boundaries to migrate elsewhere, especially young people,” says Manisha. “Restrictions on grazing made farming livelihoods difficult, and the flourishing wildlife was damaging crop yields. So, the inspiration for our business was to help these villages to sustain themselves with tourism, and that’s why we focus on entrepreneurship rather than being a charity or an NGO.”

Instead of a typical family homestay, in Binsar you’re accommodated in a village guest house, and hosted by the community as a whole. “The relationship between the villagers and the wildlife sanctuary had become very strained,” says Manisha. “We wanted to harness a passion for conservation, to get people to take charge of their forest, so it was important to engage the village as a whole. Now there is a total transformation of how people look at birds. They are themselves becoming the protectors. They like to open a book and identify new birds – they take a sense of pride in their trees and wildlife.”

Rhododendrons burn fiercely in the landscapes in April, when the Binsar Birding Festival takes place. Small groups spend ten days walking between the villages in the company of expert local guides. “We’re very proud of the difference that tourism has made here,” continues Manisha. “We have actually seen people who migrated away move back to train and become guides. They talk to you about the flora and fauna, and also local history, so walking with them becomes a very interesting form of storytelling.”

While you might be hoping to find a blue-capped rock thrush in your binoculars, a verditer flycatcher or a Himalayan bulbul, for many visitors the highlight of the Binsar Birding Festival is getting to know the local villagers. “We are there behind the scenes, but you are hosted by the community,” says Manisha. “I think our guests do like the way it’s a very natural experience. We have bird watching aficionados who have come back to spend their holidays here in Binsar seven or eight times now.”