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FESTIVAL CALENDAR · ARUNACHAL PRADESH · 009

Festivals in Arunachal Pradesh.

9 festivals across Arunachal Pradesh — organised by month.

January

Torgya Festival

Tawang

Three-day festival at Tawang Monastery featuring masked Cham dances performed by monks to drive away evil spirits and bring prosperity.

February

Losar (Monpa New Year)

Tawang

The Monpa tribe celebrates their New Year with traditional dances, yak-butter sculptures, archery contests, and community feasts at the monastery.

Reh Festival

Anini

The Reh Festival is the most significant cultural celebration of the Idu Mishmi community, marking ritual propitiation of deities and thanksgiving for harmony, health, and prosperity. The festival features traditional dances, elaborate handwoven attire adorned with bright patterns, and ancient ceremonial practices rooted in the tribe's spiritual connection with ancestral beliefs.

April

Mopin Festival

Aalo

Harvest festival of the Galo tribe, held every year for the first 5 days of April since 1966 in Aalo. Celebrants smear each other with rice flour (a sign of goodwill), perform the Popir dance, and feast on communal rice beer.

September

Solung Festival

Aalo

Post-harvest festival of the Adi and Galo tribes — buffalo sacrifice, ritual dances, traditional rice beer (apong). 3-5 days of community celebration centred around agricultural gratitude.

Ziro Music Festival

Ziro Valley

India's coolest indie music festival set in the Apatani tribal valley. Camping under stars, craft beer, independent artists from across Asia. Intimate crowd, no corporate sponsors.

Solung Festival

Pasighat

Solung is the most significant socio-religious festival for the Adi community in Pasighat, marking the completion of crop sowing and transplanting. The five-day celebration features the Ponung dance performed by women of all ages, animal sacrifices to appease agricultural deities, traditional weapon crafting, narrative songs honouring ancestral stories, and community feasts with locally brewed rice beer shared as a gesture of unity.

December

Orange Festival of Adventure & Music (OFAM)

Dambuk

India's first adventure-and-music festival, held annually in Dambuk since 2015. ATV rides, river-rafting, zip-lining by day; rock, indie and DJ sets by night. Camp-style accommodation on festival grounds.

Podi-Barbi Festival

Mechuka

Podi-Barbi is a harvest festival celebrated by the Ramo, Pai-Libo, and Bokar communities (Adi subtribes) of Mechuka, serving as thanksgiving to Mother Nature for agricultural abundance. The festival features traditional competitions (archery, wrestling, tug-of-war), the Yapung ceremony where rice beer is exchanged as a symbol of friendship and goodwill, and community feasting that strengthens social bonds.

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