Kite flyers adamant on celebrating Basant

The Kite Flying Association Rawalpindi has announced to celebrate Basant in Rawalpindi Cantonment and city areas despite a ban by the government.

On the other hand, the local administration and police have announced to implement the ban at all costs and decided to arrest kite-flyers and sellers.

A seek-and-hide is expected between the police and the Basant organisers and kite-flyers.

Kite Flyers Association Chairman Muhammad Iqbal and Aurangzeb Satti said that “Basant is a cultural festival of social entertainment and we have completely banned kite-flyers from using metal string and aerial firing”.

They said that if police stopped arrests, “we guarantee them that metal chemical strings will not be used to fly kites and there will be no aerial firing”.

They said that “Basant night” will be held in Cantonment on February 10 and a full day Basant festival will be celebrated on February 11. They said that a full day Basant festival will be celebrated in the city on February 18.

The organisers said that if it rained, it will be postponed for one week.

They said that they have ordered one million kites and strings from Gujranwala and Peshawar and separate arrangements will be made for women on roofs.

The organisers urged the government to ease the ban since they were ready to fly kites at safe places.

The Rawalpindi City Police Officer has issued strict orders to all police stations to carry out a strict operation against kite-flyers and sellers.

Police said that 50,000 kites, 10,000 strings were recovered and 56 people were arrested and sent to jail in the last 15 days.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 3^rd, 2022.