Know India

Bihu is a set of festivals of Assam and celebrated by the Assamese diaspora around the world. Bihu is celebrated thrice every year - in the months of Bohaag (Baisakh, the middle of April), Maagh (the middle of January), and Kaati (Kartik, the middle of October). The Bihus have been celebrated in Assam since ancient times. Each Bihu coincides with a distinctive phase in the farming calendar. It is one of the festivals of India which focuses on nature worshiping and not idol worshiping. The word Bihu is derived from the language of the Dimasa people. Bi means "to ask" and Shu means "peace".

Rudyard Kipling had described Spiti valley as 'a world within a world' in his celebrated novel Kim. Over a century has passed, but not much has changed in this world, as it continues to remain relatively unknown, hidden between multiple folds of valleys and mountains, a world within another world. The name 'Spiti' means 'The Middle Land', i.e. the land between Tibet and India. Bordered by Ladakh in the north, Tibet to the east, Kinnaur to the south east, and the Kullu Valley to the south, this peculiar cold desert spans an area of almost 8000 sq km.

Rural India is filled with examples where one man's vision and hard-work have accomplished seemingly impossible dreams.

It is unfortunate how man has come to believe that it's existence has to be at the cost of nature's destruction. In the mad run for urbanization, industrialization and 'civilization', we have brought down numerous forests, flattened hills and dried lakes and rivers.