Festivals of Ahmedabad

International Kite Festival

The International Kite Festival is always held in Ahmedabad on January 14, to coincide with the festival of Uttarayan or Makar Sankranti. It is a joyous day, with a bright sun, clear skies and breezes strong enough to to lift innumerable kites aloft. It is infact a celebration to mark the end of winter, when the heat of summer is still to come.

Kites are flown all over Gujarat, and Ahmedabad and Baroda become cities of Kite-flyers, when all other work is forgotten and cares are put aside for the morrow.

Kite-flying starts at dawn and continues without a pause throught the day. Friends, neighbours and total strangers battle one another for supremacy and cries of triumph rend the air when someone cuts the line of a rival. A tremondous variety of kites is seen and the connoisseur can ahoose precisely what he wants. Even the lines with which the kites are flown are specially prepared by the experts before the great day.