NORTH PARAVOOR: It did not take much time for North Paravoor, once a busy port in the ancient Muziris city, to shed its traditional attire and swing into festival mood, when the 28th edition of the Ernakulam Revenue District School Art Festival was officially launched on Tuesday.
The rhythm of music and dance reverberated the streets when 2,000-odd students clad in colourful attires took out a cultural procession. This year, the focus of the programmes is awareness on liquor abuse, plastic menace and environment protection. In the previous edition, the stress was on cultural programmes only. Dance items like margam kali, kolkali, duff muttu and band melam, performed by students from across the district, added colour to the procession.
Unlike in the last year, this time, almost all the venues witnessed performances on the first day itself, such as chaivittu natakam (Vyapari Bhavan hall) and drama competition (Samooham HS). Despite being a big draw, the venue of chavittu natakam competition witnessed unruly scenes after the participants complained about the poor condition of the stage at the Vyapari Bhavan hall.
Meanwhile, the result of the competition came as a major shock for the audience as Gothuruth St Sebastian’s HSS, which is known as the land of chavittu natakam, lost to Government HSS, North Paravoor.
When curtains came down on the first day, the Ernakulam sub-district came first with 45 points, followed by North Paravoor (40 points). Though last year’s winner Aluva started at a low note, they finished at the third position with 38 points.
On Wednesday, competitions will be held in folk dance, skit, thiruvathirakali, kathaprasangam, ottamthullal, mimicry and kathakali, igniting the spirit of the participants in the coming days.
The festival was inaugurated by V D Satheesan MLA at Government Girls Higher Secondary School. Aluva MLA Anwar Sadhath, Ernakulam MLA Hibi Eden, V P Sajeendran, former MLA K P Dhanapalan and Deputy Director of Education C A Santhosh also attended the function.