Trip To the Colourful Sonepur Mela

[rahul4640]

Friends,
It was my long time wish that I should visit the Sonepur mela at least for once. But as my daughter's school was open, neither she nor my wife could not accompany me. Hence I approached one of my friend (who was also a professional photographer) to accompany me. He had heard of this mela and he readily agreed.

But when I asked for leave from my boss at my office, a colleague of mine made a certain request. His residence was only 50 KMs away from Sonepur, at a town called Muzaffarpur and his father was suffering from some sort of liver ailment. He said that as the medicines were not available with the local druggists, he usually dispatched them by courier from Calcutta. And he requested me that as I was visiting his locality, why not we deliver some medicine to his house personally? And I readily agreed, as the medicine was meant for his octogenarian father. I was also assured that Muzaffarpur was connected with Hajipur (Sonepur) by an excellent four lane divided highway, though I shall tell about it later.

Started from home at around half past ten at night. The first toll on NH-2 was filled up with long line of trucks and took at least twenty minutes to cross. Shortly after one in the morning stopped at this hotel for some food.


NH-2 near Asansol has frequent diversions as both road widening and over-bridge construction works were going on. But no traffic jam on the Bengal-Jharkhand border. Stopped only at Barhi for tea. It was totally dark when I again started and passed Jhumritilayia lake and reached Koderma. It was a two lane undivided road with lots of trucks and buses coming from the opposite direction with their multiple headlights at high beam, so my speed came down and had to drive cautiously. Soon understood that it was customary on that section to never lower your headlamp beams and started behaving accordingly. Possibly the first time in my life used my 90/110W Philips rally bulb to my satisfaction and reached Koderma, when the lights of the dawn started to rise.

The road stretch immediately after clearing Koderma Ghat section is deplorable for about sixty KMs (till you reach Nawada) and may take even two hours to cover. My friend had not seen Nalanda ruins, hence decided to take the Rajgir route via a small town of Hisua. Nice roads again. Reached Rajgir, straight went to a hotel I stayed twice before, took a room for a few hours for a small fee, freshened up, had two hours of nap, finished breakfast and started again to visit Nalanda..

The ticket counter at the entrance.


The road to the site from the parking place, selling various items for the tourists.


Ruins of the excavated site.















From Nalanda started driving towards Patna. I was the only driver. Took the road going via Bakhtiyarpur town. The road is narrow, considering the autos and the motorcycles but is in decent shape. After Bakhtiyarpur it is an excellent four lane divided toll road up to Patna city.

Thanks for reading this. I shall post the remaining portion very soon.
Regards,
Rahul

 

[Auto_Pilot]

Re: A trip to the colourful Sonepur mela.

Sir,

I am an adventurous kind of person. These long trips excites me a lot. Eagerly awaiting for the remaining part of your trip.

 

[Chandranath]

Re: A trip to the colourful Sonepur mela.

Waiting for the remaining part Rahul. The trip that made you miss the TAI meet this time

 

[rahul4640]

I am sorry to say that the rest of the first day was pretty uneventful for me. I knew that I had to cross the Mahatma Gandhi Setu (bridge) at Patna on river Ganga to reach Hajipur and I had to deliver some medicine to a friend's house at Muzaffarpur. Fortunately Muzaffarpur was connected with Hajipur with a divided four lane highway and it was only a couple of hours, I assumed.

I was told that the Mahatma Gandhi Setu was in bad shape and crossing it might take hours. But I found that lots of policemen were deployed on the bridge and I crossed it in less that an hour. The progress so far was good. But then scenes turned away from us. The next four or five KM I was stalled due to a massive jam, which took me over two hours to clear.

It was almost three O'clock when me and my photographer friend entered a road dhaba somewhere near Muzaffarpur. After forty minutes break we started again for a small village located near Kanti Thermal Power Station.

Though the road which I then took was indeed a divided four lane road, it seemed to me that it was never given a coat of bitumen. Big potholes scattered all over. It was so much full of dust that the next four hours we had to roll up our windows and use AC, in spite of decent outside temperature, though we traveled only seven or eight KM during that time.

Reached the house of my colleague at around eight. We were cordially invited to spend the night with them, which we also accepted, because we hated wasting another four hours while returning back to Hazipur and search for a hotel.

Next morning we woke up at seven. Loved the beautiful countryside. Posting two photos. Sorry if the pictures seem irrelevant to you.




On my way back I was again subjected to long line of trucks. 50 KMs took me over three hours, though most of it was a divided four lane road.


Reached Hotel Anamika at around half past eleven. We knew that it was the only decent hotel in Hazipur. Though the receptionist offered us a reasonably spacious AC room at Rs 2100/- (including tax), after bargaining it came down to Rs 1700/-. The hotel had big parking (no WiFi). We had our bath and had our lunch from the restaurant downstairs. It is only after a couple of hours sleep that we went to see the famous Sonepur mela.

Thanks for reading. I shall write the remaining portion at the earliest.

 

[Chandranath]

Rahul, The typical Bihar countryside picture in the morning is great. Thanks for letting us take a peek into the lifestyle. If you have more such pictures please do post

 

[rahul4640]

After a nice mid-day siesta me and my friend decided to visit the mela. Took a rickshaw after some bargaining. The road was narrow and crowded.




Sonepur is separated from Hazipur, the main town by the river Gandak. Beside the railway bridge, these two places were previously connected by a narrow road bridge since the days of the British Raj. Now a new road bridge has been constructed later on the Patna-Chapra highway, through which all four wheeler traffics are passed nowadays.

During the mela times, even rickshaws are not allowed on the old bridge. But my friend had a freelance photographer's card, which he produced and the traffic inspector on duty allowed us to pass. The inspector was not much accustomed in reading English, it seemed. He went through the card and asked "Kaun newspaper"? My friend replied "Freelance". Satisfied with the reply that that we are indeed from "Freelance newspaper", we were allowed to go. Here are few pictures taken above the bridge.










One picture of the said bridge taken from below.


The bicycle, motorcycle and car parking place.



In the afternoon the bank of the river was very present.






The elephants were placed nearby, though their numbers are dwindling every year.















Thanks for reading. I shall post the remaining part soon.

 

[rahul4640]

Now going for some random shots. Later I shall show you the horses, cattle and buffaloes. Shops with aquarium fishes were also present. There were also cats, dogs and birds for sale, though unfortunately they were housed in a separate enclosure, where photography was not allowed. Inquiries revealed that these creatures feel disturbed when photographed, hence pictures are not allowed there.

In case you feel hungry, you may buy your materials here and cook it yourself.


What? You prefer non-veg food? No problem, let me confess that so do I. You shall get it here.


In case you like to have cooked food from a shop, there are possibly over a thousand stalls of varying sizes. Please go ahead and indulge yourself.















In case you are not hungry and in a buying spree, I guess so many of the things available under the sun are also available here.










One notable aspect of this mela is lots of theaters. They offer dance shows, where young girls in attractive dresses dance with popular Hindi and Bhojpuri songs. Tickets range from Rs 200/- to Rs 500/-.












In case you even like to watch roadside open air theaters, please come here.


Thanks for your patience in reading this. I shall post the remaining part with other pictures soon.

 

[krishnavamshi24]

Keep it coming, nice post and good writeup and loads of photos.

 

[rahul4640]

Keep it coming, nice post and good writeup and loads of photos.

Thank you. But re-sizing these pictures with small edits are time consumimg and cumbersome for me, who is a novice with photoshop. But I shall post some more pictures ASAP.

 

[Chandranath]

Rahul superb going. Very nice and detailed pictures. Thanks for it.
Particularly interested in knowing about the closed door auditorium theatres. Heard a lot about them too. Will check with you offline

 

[rahul4640]

Now I shall like to show you the festive attitude in the mela with some random shots. Hope you like these pictures.







Give me red.


East Central Railway is a participant like each and every year.


This is the huge, almost cavernous stage erected for the VVIPs for delivering their speeches during the inauguration of the mela. It is likely to be used for other cultural programs at the subsequent days.


This is the stall erected by the Saran district administration. Many districts also did put up similar stalls.


Inside the stall shown above you may purchase sweaters specially woven for you, as per your desired quality, size, choice and design. Give them some advance and come back after few hours.


The stalls where coloured aquarium fishes are available.




This is the famous “Maut KI Kuan”, literally meaning the well of death. This is a must see for the locals, for people of all ages, to get the thrill of driving and riding, the loudspeakers blared. I was naturally interested from the description of this show.


These following six pictures are taken by my friend Sri Prabir Chakroborty, who accompanied me to the mela. A professional photographer himself, he readily agreed and joined me when he was told by me to take the pictures of Sonepur mela. I confess that though I used an SLR myself, I could not time my shots and my own pictures taken here did not come up very well.













Thanks for watching. I shall conclude my travelogue in one more concluding post, when I shall show you the cattle, buffaloes and horses.

 

[Biswas]

your travelogue is crisp and beautiful. the pictures describes a lot which might not be possible in writing. heard about the sonepur mela but you helped in visualizing same. this concept of tailor made sweater is completely new to me.

recently i joined this forum but i have gone through your various travelogues earlier also as guest.
beginning with you, a big thanks to all, who share their experiences, so rookies like me dare to think about long road trips.

 

[rahul4640]

beginning with you, a big thanks to all, who share their experiences, so rookies like me dare to think about long road trips.

Welcome to this forum. I am sure that once you develop a passion for long drive, you will certainly like it.

 

[rahul4640]

These are my last set of pictures. For a novice with Photoshop, it is quite an effort to resize all these pictures along with bringing the file size to the permissible upload limit. Here are the pictures of cows, buffaloes and horses, which I wrote that I should show you subsequently. I shall be glad if you liked all these pictures.

Here is the market for cattle. This market is huge in size but I am showing you just a few.








These are either the buyers or the sellers.


This is about the horses.


















This horse has been sold. The new owner is shifting the horse.


A proud horse owner.


The abilities of the horses are demonstrated before the general public.





One curious onlooker.



That is all. Please feel free to put your comments. After all, this is only about a rural fare, which may not be liked by many of the the modern day city dwellers. But this is also a face of India, which I shall be glad if you like.
Regards,
Rahul Biswas,
North Calcutta.

 

[caruns]

Nice report and very nice pictures. There are many domesticated elephants in Kerala bought from sonpur mela.