'Himalayan Orange Tourism Fest a major hit among visitors in Salt Lake'

KOLKATA: Sitting at a rooftop on a lazy winter afternoon while you soak in the beauty of sunset is the perfect way to enjoy the goodness of oranges. But Kolkata had one more place to offer to its people to savour the delicious seasonal fruit.

The Himalayan Orange Tourism Festival, 2022, organised at City Center, Salt Lake had on display some of the finest collections of oranges imported from Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Bhutan, Nepal and Sikkim along with a variety of traditional dishes and household items.

The festival was held from December 9 to 11. What was unique about this festival iwas that it was also selling a myriad of traditional dishes. One such interesting Nepalese dish available was the 'Sel Roti.' And needless to say, momos are in abundance.

Visitors enjoyed watching the native women making fresh momos in their respective stalls with happy faces. Moreover, there were some stalls where a variety of handmade pickles, including red chilli pickle, tamarind pickle, raddish pickle, bamboo shoots pickle, among others were up for grabs. For the tea lovers, green tea and black tea straight from the tea gardens of Darjeeling were also available in plenty.

To make the event even more lively, a variety of special traditional dances had also been arranged for the public. "Dancers from Bhutan, Nepal, Arunachal Pradesh, Darjeeling, Sikkim, Kalimpong have come under one roof to add colours to the ongoing festival. Traditional dance forms such as Tshe tshu cham, Gurung, Ragsha Mang Tsham, among others are being showcased," said a stall owner.

Another star attraction of the festival worth a mention was a variety of honey showcased at one of the stalls. One would be surprised to notice the different types of honey that were in display and had been collected by Kolkata-based honey collector Swarnendu Sarkar.

On being asked about the different types of honey, Sarkar said: "I travel extensively across India to extract honey. So far, I collected 35 types of honey, including rosewood and berry honey from Rajasthan, sunflower from Gujarat, acacia from Himachal Pradesh, jamun from Haryana, mustard from West Bengal, tulsi from Madhya Pradesh, etc."