Come Commonwealth Games, Meghalaya will have something special to offer. The Garos of western Meghalaya are preparing to present Wangala — a traditional dance and music form which is popularly called the Hundred Drums festival — as part of the opening ceremony of the much-awaited sports event in New Delhi. It was only last week that Oscar winning musician A R Rahman sent a team to Tura to watch and capture in video Wangala, as the Garos performed it to mark the end of the harvest season.

BAMBOO CHARCOAL TO FUEL NAGALAND

Nagaland is aiming at converting bamboo into charcoal in order to meet its fuel requirements. The Nagaland Bamboo Development Agency has set up 45 bamboo charcoal production kilns across the state with support from the National Mission on Bamboo Applications, setting a target of producing 11.25 tonnes of bamboo charcoal per day. With a calorific value of 6,700 kcal/kg and carbon content of 80 to 85 per cent, charcoal produced from bamboo comes at just Rs 4 per kg.

SAY ‘NO SMOKING’ THE MIZO WAY

The Mizos do not do different things, they just do things differently. The state’s tobacco control authorities last week announced the Zamzo Award for the Directorate of Industries office in Aizawl for being the least polluted place by cigarette smoke. They also made public the selection of an ‘awardee’ for the Dirty Ashtray award. Interestingly, though a private shop in the town was selected for it, the authorities took care not to make its name public, thus giving it a chance to reform!

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