Aie River Dwijing Festival in Bodoland, Assam
India has innumerable festivals, many of them on river banks. Many of these are religious in nature, but some celebrate the change of season. Aie River Festival in Bodoland Assam is one of them. It is popular as Dwijing Festival in Bodoland. Dwijing in Bodo language means river bank. Bodoland Territorial Council is promoting the event to garner support and encouragement for the rural locals.
I traveled to Bodoland as a part of the group Ambassadors of Bodoland along with several other bloggers, instagrammers and Youtuber to visit Dwijing Festival and for several local experiences in villages of Bodoland. So here I am as an Ambassador of Bodoland sharing with you my travel experiences in Bodoland, Assam.
Picture taken from Hagrama Bridge.
Aie River Bodoland
The first place we visited was the fair. I walked along Aie River soaking in its festive mood. To me the river looked calm and docile making it difficult to picture an image of it flooding the banks. We approached it via the Hagrama Bridge from Bongaigaon. Aie River originates from the foothills of Himalayas. During monsoons when there is heavy rainfall in Bhutan where Aie River originates, the river swells up and the banks get flooded destroying and disturbing the lives of people settled in villages Dababil, Naturbari, Madarpur, Koirabari, Debarbil, Khanibhur of Chirang district.
Thus every year the river takes different forms after it dries up. What was under the swirling turbulent waters is now dry and those that I am seeing under water now may be a dry river bed the next season. Locals always live under that constant threat of their homes of getting washed away, yet they have learned to adjust and rehabilitate themselves after every rough season.
There is a silent green revolution on in Chirang district to change the sandy desert face to green cover. Along with it several business opportunities have been initiated for the flood affected rural folks. This Dwijing Festival is one among those initiatives to help improve the locals.
Such a brilliant concept of celebrating the joy of being alive in the same river bank! Isn’t this the one which once snatched their homes? Today the river bed is returning back livelihood to the same rural folks!
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- Dwijing Festival Bodoland Assam the venue.
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- Dwijing Festival Bodoland Assam the stage for performances.
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- Little bridges over streams of Aie river.
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- Dwijing Festival Bodoland Assam stalls along river bank.
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- Dwijing Festival Bodoland Assam main venue.
Dwijing Festival Fair
I saw the river bank lined with stalls encouraging ethnic trade and food. Little bridges over the criss-crossing streams connected the different islands on the river bed. There are exhibitions, games & sports, river campaign & adventure and various culture programs to make it a center of attraction for the visitors as a New Year Festival too. The cultural events that went on late into nights were spiced with local artists, artists from other states of India and also from Bollywood and neighboring foreign countries.
What to say of the finger licking ethnic food at the various stalls there! One of the fastest selling items there was the tekli pitha. It is a kind of round shaped rice cake stuffed with crushed sesame seeds mixed with jaggery. They were making them on the spot and to bite into the warm ones was heavenly. There were a few food stall with cuisine from Bhutan too providing a golden opportunity to taste the widely acclaimed Bhutanese food.
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- Dwijing Festival weaving in looms.
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- Dwijing Festival traditional rituals
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- Dwijing Festival pan and arecanut
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- Dwijing Festival pan and arecanut.
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- Dwijing Festival ethnic food tekli pitha
They even put up a model of a typical Bodo House; how people live, their agricultural tools and the stuffs they use on regular basis. Weaving is one of their main sources of livelihood and we got to see a Bodo woman at the loom.
Blurred Perimeters by Wahida Ahmed
A section of the venue is dedicated to modern artists led by Ms. Wahida Ahmed. Their concept is called Blurred perimeters. They have unique art installations depicting situations in life through various kinds of creations.
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- Wahida Ahmed Blurred perimeters Bodoland.
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- Art work 1 Blurred perimeters Wahida Ahmed
The site is a bustling scene, with a variety of handicraft and food stalls, active street hawkers and merchants selling everything from trinkets to machinery. Besides these there were adventure aquatic events, camel riding, helicopter rides (Rs.3000), balloon rides. They have even arranged a jungle safari to Kalamati, a small part of Manas National Park. I will be blogging on that soon. The whole scene is spread over a wide area. The festival very well showcases the vibrant colors and culture of Bodo people in Assam.
When is Dwijing Festival held
This is the 3rd consecutive year that Aie River Festival, popularly known as Dwijing Festival is being conducted. And this time it is on a much bigger and grander scale. It is a 12 day festival and this year the dates are from 27th December 2018 to 7th Jan 2019. The security arrangements are very good. That is not only at the festival but also at all places I traveled through in Bodoland.
How to reach Dwijing Festival in Bodoland
The nearest airport is Guwahati Airport, that takes 3 and half hours approx. Nearest Railway station is Bongaigaon station. You can make a road trip to the place via NH31 which is well maintained and in good condition.
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- Dwijing Bihu dancer
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- dwijing festival Thai Dancers
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- dwijing festival african dance artists
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- Dwijing fashion show collage
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- Dwijing Fashion show
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- Dwijing Bihu dancer 2
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- Dwijing Bihu dance drummer
Stay Options for Dwijing Festival
My stay was taken care of at Cygnett Park Meghana, a 4 star property in Bongaigaon. There are plenty of stay options in and around Bongaigaon. The Dwijing Festival venue too has good stay options in tents, both basic and premium tents, to experience the festival better.
Tickets to Dwijing Festival: The tickets are for very nominal rates of Rs. 20 per person.
This trip was possible through Ambassadors of Bodoland group.
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Your wonderful pictures capture the essence of the festival. Sometimes its unreal to think of how many contrasts we have in our country. Assam is a whole different world.
Love the colorful stalls and your description of cross crossing over bridges to visit them all. Tekli pitha sounds like something I would very much like. What a great opportunity for you
This is really interesting to me as I want to revisit India and there is so much more than the Holi festival. The Dwijing festival looks amazing
This looks so amazing. Was following all of yours journey via Insta and FB. Too bad I wasn’t here in India, else I might have joined you guys too as an Ambassador to Bodoland. What I love after reading these posts is the cultural variety in India. You are sure to have a unique experience in every place in India.
I know it’s a great festival dwijing is, based on the pictures you’ve taken of course. And how exciting to be with other group of bloggers and youtubers, too! Just being curious tho, some pictures here are too big and too small, not sure if it’s my screen or something, also, some writings and text can’t be visible because it’s covered by the large sizes of pictures, maybe you can check that out, Indra. Anyway, I hope you had a wonderful time at the festival! xx
For some reason it is not configuring well with Chrome. In Firefox it is fine. Thanks for cautioning me 🙂
I’m not sure which would excite me more — the fair or the food. I would probably give myself a stomachache sampling the various stalls of food. The tekli pitha sounds amazing.
I always love local festivals and Dwijing Festival looks amazing. I love all the bright colors and pictures. The dancers look amazing as well. This looks like a festival I’d enjoy attending 🙂
I love the way that the festival blends historic traditions and modern art into one representation of the culture. Plus, who could pass up an opportunity for a jungle safari? Count me in!
Wow it certainly sounds like there was a lot going on at the festival! I love trying local food and the tekli pitha sounds delicious! The colour of the fabric the lady is weaving is gorgeous too, so bright and beautiful!
Wow! Must be so difficult to deal with the stress of a monsoon possibly destroying homes of the people in the villages surrounding the Aie River ? I would love to visit the merchants and especially the food stalls at the Festival Fair. Also to enjoy the culture, sounds like lots of fun! ????
A riverside festival sounds amazing! I love how they’ve put letters of the name of the festival partially in Hindi and English hehe. Stalls encouraging ethnic trade and food is a wonderful idea. The vibe must be amazing!
We have been thinking of a trip to Assam. Any recommendations besides tea gardens, Majuli and Kaziranga? Which would be a good place to stay?
This is my first time in Assam.
You can visit Bodoland.
India has such an interesting culture. I have never attended a religious festival, or one dedicated to the change of the seasons. I’d love to visit Bodoland and to find out more about the culture, arts and foods in this area. Good to know what the lodging options for Dwijing Festival are.
Wonderful festival with so many different aspects. I always appreciate the traditional crafts and foods but it’s lovely to see that new artists are encouraged as well. Congratulations on being a Bogoland Ambassador too!
Bodoland looks beautiful. What an interesting trail that the Aie River takes. I would love to visit the Dwijing Festival, to learn more about the arts, lifestyle and foods of the area. The tekli pitha sound delicious!
Nice to know that aside from the most famous cultural festival in India which is the Holi festival, there’s one more reason to go to India for a lesser known festival for those who do not like to deal with big crowds.
It’s so nice to see that these festivals showcasing local culture are getting bigger and better. Long live their culture and traditions.
Appreciative efforts to show Bodo culture and to provide livelihood to the locals. I hope you enjoyed there a lot with the group .. I know only about Abhinav Singh . Thank you for sharing a lovely post .
Looks like fun!
Great to read. Awesome Dwijing Festival.
Hope next year will visit the fest. Thank you so much for beautiful post and pics.
Greetings from Assam