Ban on kite-flying

There are no kites flittering across Lahore’s spring skies this year. Those kites vanished a long time ago, since 2005, when the Punjab government, for the first time, imposed a total ban on kite-flying in the city on the basis that sharp string resulted in deaths when throats were slit — most notably involving people riding on motorbikes. Since then, the ban has been upheld by the Lahore High Court and again by the Punjab government.

This year, a decision announced earlier to hold a kite-flying festival from mid-February onwards in the Changa Manga forest area close to Lahore has now been abandoned, apparently after reports that chemically treated twine was still in circulation. But rather than plucking out kites, which have been a part of Lahore’s heritage for centuries, out of the skies, it is this twine apparently coming in mainly from China that needs to be tackled. A ban on it needs to be placed and enforced.

There can be no excuse for taking kite-flying and Basant away from the people of Lahore. Yes, the deaths have been tragic; but deaths occur too through traffic accidents. This does not mean a ban on vehicles; it means that we need better measures to protect those in them or on the streets.

Basant was a festival that united people across class and religion, offering an important form of entertainment to millions of youngsters, including those from deprived backgrounds. Kites, after all, cost little and stray ones can be acquired.

The ban on flying them has also caused the loss of thousands of jobs. The situation needs remedy. The tradition of kite-flying in Lahore must not be allowed to die, but passed down from one generation to the next as has traditionally been the case. If Basant can take place in large cities of India, there is no reason why we should fail to hold it on the grounds of safety which, we suspect, may be laced with hidden extremism that holds kite-flying and Basant as something that should not be acceptable in our society.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 16^th, 2014.

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