Photos: The Harvest Festivals

dynamitenews.com

New Delhi/ 14 January 2017.  A harvest festival is an annual celebration that occurs around the time of the main harvest of a given region.

Given the differences in climate and crops around the world, harvest festivals can be found at various times at different places. Harvest festivals typically feature feasting, both family and public, with foods that are drawn from crops that come to maturity around the time of the festival.

Ample food and freedom from the necessity to work in the fields are two central features of harvest festivals: eating, merriment, contests, music and romance are common features of harvest festivals around the world.

In India, Makar Sankranti, Thai Pongal, Uttarayana, Lohri, and Magh Bihu or Bhogali Bihu in January, Holi in February–March, Vaisakhi in April and Onam in August–September are a few important harvest festivals.

Here are some of the glimpses:

Devotees prepare rice dishes to offer to the Hindu Sun God as they attend Pongal celebrations early morning in Mumbai.

Devotees prepare rice dishes to offer to the Hindu Sun God as they attend Pongal celebrations early morning in Mumbai.

A Sadhu or a Hindu holy man carrying his pet monkey walks after taking a dip at the confluence of the river Ganges and the Bay of Bengal on the occasion of "Makar Sankranti" festival at Sagar Island in Kolkata.

Students perform a traditional folk dance near a bonfire as they celebrate the Lohri festival, which marks the culmination of winter in many parts of northern India, inside a college in Chandigarh.

People queue to buy fish on the occasion of Bhogali Bihu or the harvest festival of Assam, at Raha town in Nagaon district, Assam.

A Sadhu or a Hindu holy man holds his pet monkey as he walks inside a makeshift shelter, before heading for an annual trip to Sagar Island for the one-day festival of "Makar Sankranti", in Kolkata,