Senapati: The 3rd Cosmos Flower Festival was flagged off at Naamai Zho, the adopted home to thousands of Cosmos flowers of varied colours bursting into bloom by KS Solomon and H Poukho, the Chairman of Upper Koide village and Lower Koide village respectively. The lovely, romantic view of Cosmos flowers swaying in the crisp autumn breeze witnessed a footfall of more than 5000 tourists from different walks of life.
Y Mathew, President of NETS in his Keynote address shares that the Koide Women Society manually transformed and nurtured the barren valley as the inspiration for social transformation during the Covid-19 lockdown. “The present day Cosmos bloom is a symbol of ‘Resilience,’ a living testimony of how connecting with mother nature and embracing her creates extraordinary relationships; a divine love story between men and nature,” he added.
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The festival featured story telling about the genesis of Cosmos Bloom, Spot painting competition, photography contest and Short video contest on the theme “Cosmos Bloom at Naamai Zho” during the day. Stalls for exhibition and sales of traditional cuisines and beverages added spice to the event.
The highlight of the festival was Musika Cosmos: An inter-ethnic tribe music festival featuring renowned artists Thangmeiso Shinglai, Ninshimphy Muivah and Boikim Haokip along with a host of local artists enthralling the visitors with their popular songs to promote communal harmony and peaceful co-existence. Further, the festival was celebrated in sync with the Manipur State Tourism policy to promote Ek Bharat Shrestha Bharat.
Speaking of the future roadmap, Ng Ngaorai, Project Consultant, NETS shared, “The primary guiding principle of the festival is to promote sustainable, responsible, and inclusive tourism, which will cut across all the initiatives to make Naamai Zho, one of the top tourist destinations. Our mission is to bring all possible tourism activities and stakeholders together for achieving sustainable tourism that creates opportunities for sustainable livelihood for the marginalized sections of society.
The valedictory function was graced by Maj General VK Nambiar, YSM, SM IGAR (East) as chief guest and Shivanand Surve, IPS, Superintendent of Police (SP), Senapati and Col Aditya Deo, Maram Battalion.