SHILLONG: Though a rape case marred the last year’s Winter Festival formerly known as Simsang Festival, the precautions taken by the East Garo Hills District Administration resulted in ensuring peace in the festival this year round while attracting a huge crowd.
This three-day festival which started on December 4, ended on a peaceful note on Friday and witnessed a good crowd with various programmes like beauty pageant, live band performances etc which added fun and fervour to the festival.
To ensure that there was no repetition of last year’s incident, the District Administration deployed enough police forces in and around the town with patrolling team and magistrate rounding the entire town till 12 midnight before and after the function.
“The parents were very cautious and this time, we had directed all the youth to head home straight after the function to avoid getting into any trouble besides which, patrolling in the whole town was ensured till late night so that no unwanted elements roamed the streets at night,” East Garo Hills DC Vijay Mantri said.
Unlike last year, Simsang Beat Contest which attracted many bands from all over the State last year was left out from the list due to pressure from the locals who complained of the loudness. “We had substituted the contest with the beauty pageant,” Mantri said.
Last year, soon after the festival ended, 16 boys took advantage of a 16-year-old girl who was returning home from the festival and gang-raped her. At present, some accused have been forwarded to the Juvenile Justice Board while others have been arrested and forwarded to court, the trial of which is still going on in the Tura Fast Track Court.
