Elephants, acrobats enliven ancient
Sri Lankan Buddhist festival
Nearly 100 caparisoned elephants, dancers and torchbearers walked down the streets of this central city decorated with colourful lights and flags as the annual Buddhist festival of Kandy Perahera (pageant) was celebrated with great enthusiasm.
The colourful parade began Saturday night from the sacred Buddhist shrine of Dalada Maligawa, showcasing the temple custodians known as Nilames, who were dressed up like ancient kings. The festivities also included traditional Kandyan dancers, fire-juggling acrobats, palanquins, musicians and torchbearers, who followed the elephants through the streets.
Kandy Perahera is celebrated annually ever since the sacred tooth relic of Buddha was brought to
Similar festivals take place in other parts of the country, including capital
The grand finale of the 10-day celebrations in
Dalada Maligawa was also hit by the decades-long ethnic war when a suicide cadre of the Tamil Tiger rebels blew up an explosive-laden truck right in front of the temple, causing damage to the shrine in April 1998.
But the temple faced the first attack during the insurrection of the radical Marxist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) in the 1980’s.
The highlight of Saturday’s parade was the brightly festooned Maligawa Tusker called Raja, the biggest elephant in the procession, proudly carrying the Perahera Karanduwa, the replica of the casket in which the sacred tooth relic of Lord Buddha is kept.
The actual relic is kept inside seven caskets in the inner sanctum of the Dalada Maligawa.
On the directions of the mahouts, Raja and other elephants walked in measured steps and seemed as though they were moving to the beats of the traditional drummers.
In
The procession was flanked by torch-bearers, who steadfastly carried long, flaming wooden poles.
Although the country has been suffering from one of the bloodiest ethnic conflicts, this colourful pageant in
Prepared by Amila suranga perera