Leisure period

Manpriya Singh

Early hours of Day 2 at the Chandigarh Carnival sees a decent number of visitors, assorted crowds, listless organizers, more constants and a few changes. Chandigarh Tourism presents Chandigarh Carnival 2015 with the customary amusement activities, camel rides, ample photo ops with life-size floats, live portraits, some dust flying around, fast food bites and the like.

While the exhibit participation by various city-based academies is understandable, not the stall for manufacturing unit for lithium batteries. There is enough to munch on with CITCO Da Vehra, food stalls by Chandigarh Institute of Hotel Management, quite enough to play with (tattoo counters, throw a ring, balloon shooting), but not enough to browse around. If only the curios and knick-knacks, like scented candles, hand-made diaries, sling bags, extended both in quantity and quality.

Evening entertainment includes a comedy night with Rana Ranbir, followed by live performance by Gurnazar band. The last day will see a Punjabi musical night by Manmohan Waris and Kamal Heer. Fitted in the schedule is a vintage car display at the Museum & Art Gallery

A close brush with art

The right hand side section at the entrance has as many as 13 artists working live on individual paintings. Colours, canvas and quietude amidst the noise, rides, crowds. “This is an endeavour to bring art closer to people and people closer to art,” shares Bheem Malhotra, chairperson, Chandigarh Lalit Kala Akademi, on the initiative to have the section at a prominent place.

Get spell bound

Moving on, the Government Museum and Art Gallery presents puppet artists from Gujarat, even though it is quite a task to find out the where-about and timings, let alone hope for an interaction. Meanwhile, a mini stage set up by Chandigarh Sangeet Natak Akademi is out inviting those with a gift of the gab, a knack for the stage, a social message for the audience, a random song...anybody to engage the crowd.

Behind the stage is Ambala-based magician SK Sharma, all geared in bright orange magician’s costume, looking forward to spell bind the crowd. He shares, “I want to convey a message against trickery and tell people not to fall prey to such hypnosis. I am going to make someone’s gold bangle or watch out from other another person’s pocket. In real life, tricksters will not return these things you.”

As much as magic, the image of magicians is stuck with clichéd costumes, boxes, pigeons and hats. All that is slowly set to change and how! “Some of the tricks I’ll be performing are 5,000 years old. The person performing is different and so are the people watching. The presentation has changed and even the long lost tricks are now all new.” He adds, “I don’t use any boxes or cupboards.” He found his calling, “after watching a magic show by Samrat Shankar.”

Call it a science, call it an art, at the end of the day it is just that, entertainment. “There can be so many other uses of magic and hypnosis. A significant per cent of health problems are mental, they ought to be treated with mind tricks,” he signs off, for it’s time to make the noisy crowd think.

On till November 29 at Leisure Valley—10