Decibel-free fest in Sivaganga bird-friendly village; respite for Tirunelveli hamlet

Residents of Kollukudipatti in Sivaganga district has decided not to burst crackers to welcome the migratory birds, which have started visiting the Vettangudi Bird Sanctuary located in their village for years. Birds from various countries and parts of India visit the Vettangudi sanctuary from September to February. Apart from the migratory birds, some regular birds have also nested atop the trees in the sanctuary. To safeguard the birds and their eggs the residents had stopped bursting crackers, which would usually give shivers to the birds.

They take pride in their conservation of environment by not bursting crackers to make the village a happy place for birds. Speaking to DT Next, Arumugam, former Panchayat president of the village, said that the practice of no crackers started roughly before 30 years. 

“Earlier, during the time of Deepavali, we had exploded loud crackers and on hearing the sound, the birds started to shake vigorously. In the process their eggs fell down and were damaged. On seeing the birds shiver, we held a meeting with our village elders and then decided not to burst crackers,” said Arumugam. 

Another resident, Raman, said that initially it was tough to maintain their vow and was difficult to explain it to the children. However, the practice of bursting crackers stopped after two or three years after taking the decision. 

Later, they also stopped the practice of placing loud speakers on the occasion of temple festivals. Crackers are not exploded even during deaths in the village, said Raman. 

However, on the other hand, residents of Koonthankulam village in Tirunelveli, who had been desisting from exploding crackers during the time of Deepavali, had now decided to burst crackers largely because of the conspicuous absence of birds in their village. 

Members of Vaippar Karisal Farmers Association at Thoothukudi celebrated Deepavali with less privileged differently-abled people, who were visually-impaired at Ayanvadamalapuram village in Thoothukudi district. Nearly, 170 farmers from Thoothukudi, Tirunelveli and Kanniyakumari districts participated in the celebrations. Games such as musical chair, rope pulling and so on were conducted for them and prices were given.

Following irregularities in the sale of crackers, the licence of 41 shops has been suspended in Virudhunagar district on Tuesday. Owing to Deepavali many cracker shops have mushroomed in and around Sivakasi. Though they have proper licence to sell crackers, various irregularities have been reported. Following this officials conducted a raid on the shops and found that in some of the boxes the name of the manufacturing company and the date of manufacture were not mentioned.