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Curtains fall on North East Festival

The recently concluded 7th edition North East Festival at IGNCA, New Delhi, which started in 2013 to build bridges among people of NE and rest of India through music and culture, has evolved over the years as a platform to discuss serious issues of the region, promote trade, tourism, music, and talents. The North East Festival saw a footfall of two lakh people this year.

In the B2B sessions of Buyer-Seller meet for business, tourism and textile, the buyers outnumbered the sellers. Arijit Purakayastha, President ADTOI North East Chapter expressed his satisfaction about getting good response from various tour and travel operators of Delhi NCR. Likewise, Sushant Phukan who put up a cloth stall at the festival said that the B2B sessions were really fruitful as buyers in large numbers came with business queries and orders.

The festival also honoured three people – Robin Hibu, IPS (Helping Hand NGO), Kalyan Barooah (Journalist, The Assam Tribune), and Temsutula Imsong (Sakaar Sewa Samiti) from the region with the North East Festival Recognition Award for their immense contribution in their respective fields of running an NGO, journalism and working for sustainable development respectively. Food stalls were a hit again, some of the stalls did business between 2 to 4 lakh in just three days. As many as 40 food stalls have been set up that provides the regional delicacies .

While inaugurating the festival, Kiren Rijiju, Union Minister for Youth Affairs and Sports said, "When I see someone coming here, I say, if you haven't seen Northeast, you have not seen India."

Commenting on the Festival, Dr Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) stated: "The response to the three-day event has been overwhelming and rather beyond expectation."

Rameshwar Teli, Minister of State, Ministry of Food Processing Industries, said, "I ask the people from outside the region in an echo to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's words that if you are tired, head to North East and you will be refreshed. If you come to North East you will feel that it is like heaven on earth."

Fashion shows by designers from North East were the attraction of the event and were highly appreciated by the fashion connoisseurs. Bipul Chhetri, Zubeen Garg, Papon, Zublee enthralled the audience with their electric performance.

With a pledge to save over 220 indigenous languages of the region in the years to come after the United Nations have declared 2019 as year of World's Ethnic Language, the curtains were brought down on the three-day North East Festival.

Delhi Police's Special Police Unit for North East Region, was there to create awareness about their facilities specially North East Assistance Team.

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