The festival of Diwali was celebrated with fervour and tradition in the city. From exchanging gifts to visiting temples and gurudwaras, the residents maintained the traditional fervour of the festival. But some opted out their own ways to celebrate the day.

The shopkeepers, especially stall holders, remained busy throughout the day selling earthen lamps, candles, decoration pieces, statues of gods, flowers etc. It was observed that due to awareness campaign against use of spurious khoya sweets preparation, some people preferred to buy other eatables like cakes, fruits, juices and dry-fruit etc. But many kept buying the sweets from city sweet shops throughout the day.

Sandeep Kumar, an employees, said, “It is ironical that the District Health department took the samples of the city’s prominent sweet-makers on October 14, results of which which come after the festival. By that time they would have made huge profits by selling sweets.” While Arun Sharma, another resident, said, “I wonder why the health department took samples from these shops just a few days before Diwali, and not earlier?”

Simillary the residents paid little heed to the pleas from the environmentalists, NGOs and concerned citiznes to not to burst crackers and limit the harm tp the enviornment. To make people aware about environment pollution, a huge Rangoli was drawn in the Sarabha Nagar market, conveying the message, “Do not make planet earth an oven. Avoid crackers.”

But all this seemed to have little difference to the city residents as the cracker stalls continued to attract a huge rush of people throughout the day, with people — of all age groups — jostling to lay their hands on their favourite cracker. The city also witnessed traffic jams at many places which keep the traffic police on the toes.

... contd.