Firecracker tragedy in Belthangady

Mangaluru: The temple festival season on the coast will soon be here; starting in February, it will stretch up to July 14, the beginning of the Dakshinayana (Southern Solstice), and strangely, the temples and Shrines here consider bursting crackers a part of the tradition. When and how this destructive and woeful practice crept in nobody can remember; perhaps it has something to do with the entertainment part of it, which aberration, has crept in sometime during the consumer movement began in India.

The managements of the temples and Daiva Sthanas make it a point to burst crackers that make big noise in the middle of the nights and throughout the night, keeping society around the temple and Daiva Sthanas awake all night, unmindful of the hardships to old and feeble, sick people and students who are preparing for exams and those people who have to go to work next day.

In the wake of the horrendous blast in a firecracker unit in Belthangady on Sunday (January 28) a whole new ecosystem has been exposed, which is giving impetus to the growth of highly toxic, exploitative, and life threatening explosives industry, which is also unlicensed and spurious.

Following the Belthangady blast the district authorities are bracing up for unearthing unchartered and unlicenced firecracker units in Dakshina Kannada district and intel info has been shared with Udupi and Uttara Kannada district too.

District officials who spoke to Hans India on conditions of anonymity told that following the fire in Kollam temple in Kerala some time in 2016 when 111 people were killed and over 300 injured when the firecracker display went awry and followed by 2017 when two people dead in a fire cracker unit in Vitla the police are sparing no effort to make the fire crackers show in the temple festival safe for public attending the temple festivities.

Many temples on the coast including Kollur Mookambika, Udupi Sri Krishna, Kukke Subramanya, Kateel Durgaparameshwari, Polali Rajarajeshwari, Mahabaleshwara Temple at Gokarna Mangaladevi in Mangaluru are big time users of fireworks during the annual fairs and festivities. Many of them buy firecrackers from their traditional suppliers and some have it custom made which are lit during the Ratha Utsavs (Car festivals).

The custom made firecrackers are more dangerous say the people who burn them, “There are three types of fire crackers that is traditionally prepared by the locals, the most powerful one is called ‘Kadhoni’ which takes half kg of gunpowder mixed with salt and stuffed tightly into a pipe and buried inside the ground, it has a long gunpowder smeared wick, the person who lights it will have to run for his life after sparking the wick, the sound that is created by Kadhoni rattles the ground for at least 100 meters around and even the elephants during the festivals get rattled and sometimes make violent movements. In 2006 four persons had died in Puttur taluk during manufacturing the Kadhoni which had made the then Assistant Commissioner K A Appaiah direct the temple authorities to do away with Kadhoni” says an elder in Puttur.

The district police and explosives department have core competence to carry out the checking the quality and safety aspects. In Dakshina Kannada district there are 7 licenced manufacturers and 50 sellers of firecrackers. Four manufacturers have been asked to shutdown shops after the Vitla incident in 2017. But the police and the department aver that some of the old units might be functioning and they will soon begin the search operations for the unlicenced units.

*Another dangerous firework is ‘Garnalu’ which is a thrown up into the sky after it is lit, sometimes the Garnalu does not explode in the sky and comes down and falls into the crowd, to burn Garnalu only Muslims are preferred as they have mastered the art of burning them.

Alarmed by the irrational and irresponsible ways of use of explosives during the temple festivals and the spirit worship shrines during the Bhoota Kolas the Deputy Commissioners in the past have sent guidelines for the use of fire crackers. An official of the explosives department told Hans India, “The guidelines were clear, - the firecrackers beyond certain decibels cannot be burst in a crowded place in high decibel crackers like Kadhoni, Bedi and Garnalu there should be clear area of at least 50 meters”.

*All temples burn the iconic ‘Bedi’ which is a large firecrackers that is usually sounded to announce beginning of a temple festival. Kumble (30 kms from Mangaluru) is known for its Bedi. Puttur is also known for its own version of Bedi.

*Udupi has a unique lineage of locally made fireworks. During the Utsavas the fireworks are lit in front of Mitra Samaja and again near the Admaar mutt.

*All the three types of traditional crackers are lit during the Bhoota Kolas, (spirit worship) during February to April. It goes on throughout the night and disturbs the sleep of people and the children who study for the exams during that time.

*Only the Jain temples do not use any type of fireworks, for they believe bursting crackers are also a kind of violence. Jain Mutts, in Shravanabelagola (Hassan) Humcha (Shivamogga) Moodbidri and Venur (Dakshina Kannada) and Karkala (Udupi) have banished fireworks during their festivities.

*the fringe groups that take up the work of burning crackers do not give a damn about the rules, instead they use the influence of their leaders to gag the police and fire officials.