Festivals, ah! It is a word which springs to mind when one things of blissful, untrammelled joy, alongside the glorious rhythm of ebullient exuberance. For many people it is something they look forward to from the dawn of the year and for others it is all that the year builds up towards, culminating in a glorious flourish of love, worship, and in some other times, a washout of any pent-up emotions that might have built up throughout the year. In what may seem to many, as a customary blowout of dance and joy that provides a window to throw our negativity out, there is a virulent undercurrent of economic restiveness that runs deep beneath the surface. This essay is an expedition on the author’s part to shed light on how exactly festivals shape the course of the economy, in their own unique way.
Right off the bat, it is imperative to address how the festival season gets underway before it actually begins, with preparations starting months, if not weeks, ahead of the date ringed on the calendar. The localised economies of the communities celebrating the festival kick into high gear before the fateful day arrives as they get to churning out products, providing services, and making purchases all of which combined serve as a shot in the arm of the economy, upping the circulation of money and beefing up the production of local industries and factories, be it small or big. The footprint that a festival leaves on the economy is often long-lasting and indelible to a fair degree, leaving a mark that often serves as a bellwether for the direction and mobility of the economy.
Firstly, festivals bring forth the rise in the demand of certain products which, in most cases, are manufactured locally and the ones which require importing from abroad begin to be replicated in the community as well providing a cheap alternative for local buyers, which in turn, allows a larger portion of people than usual to engage in transactions. This two-pronged spear of increased demand and production concentrated in a tight window of time creates a temporary rise in employment, as the majorly informal sector associated with the meets the impetus provided by demand, a large chunk of people initially pushed out of the picture are reeled back in as the need for labour goes through the roof for this small, yet lucrative, window of opportunity.
Travellers are often wooed by festivals as the holidays and the unending cavalcade of lights, rituals, and ceaseless waves of joy on seventh heaven serve as ingredients to the recipe of the mouth-watering epicure of celebration and euphoria. This in turn, intensifies the demand for hotels and other places of transient accommodation. Online travel brokers and as well as sites such as Oyo record their highest fares during the festival season, with the cost on average being 30% more than what it usually is. It allows the travel industry to make up for any lull that might have preceded the festival season as well as make headway towards their end goals.
In a spitting image of the aforementioned phenomena, Airliners and Railways record unprecedented levels of demand which sends prices rocketing through the roof, leading to increased spending on the travellers’ end as well as higher frequencies of transport eating into the resources of the ones who provide it. The combination of high spending on both ends does nothing but push the Economy’s tail up as the increasing circulation of money adds steam to the fiscal engine.
However, if brought under the microscope, one can see that this boom in spending and demand serves a double-edged sword for more than a few reasons. Firstly, the sharp, concentrated boom generated in this period is, more often than not, short lived and fizzles out in a heartbeat once the festival buzz simmers down. This leads to a collapse in the demand, taking the wind out of the sails of all the new industries that crop up, leaving the workers involved to take for other ventures or modes of employment. However, many of the people from marginalised sections find themselves having nowhere to go as their services are no longer required and the hole of destitution which a few weeks ago seemed a thing of the past slowly starts gaping behind them again. This is unfortunately, a recurring trend where a large contingent of people is thrown under the bus because of the lack of any safety to hold the vulnerable people once the boom quiets down and the hype spirals down into a quick, stupefying end.
Festivals are also known to make different major retailers, e commerce sites, and malls pull out different tricks from the hat in an attempt to draw customers. It is not merely an act of feathering one’s nest however, as the attractive offers, and rare sales create an environment of increased spending which stimulates the economy. Consider this as killing two birds with one stone, with both the market and the general economy striking gold.
It is without a shadow of a doubt that the festival season is one of the most lucrative windows to bolster the economy, with a lot of amazing things and circumstances going for the season as a whole. The river however runs deeper, as a lack of policies to cushion the fall in demand after the season is coming to light. A pragmatic, open minded approach is all it needs to mitigate the shortcomings and bring forth an economy that has nothing for no one and something for everyone.
By: Pragyan Chakravarty
Write and Win: Participate in Creative writing Contest & International Essay Contest and win fabulous prizes.
Essay Title of the Month
- How to write an essay fast
- what is Essay Bot
- How to write good Review Essay
- How to write a 5 page essay
- How to write an interpretive essay
- How to write dialogue in an essay
- When revising an informative essay it is important to consider……….(what to be considered)
- Women empowerment essay
- How to get essay editing jobs and how lucrative it is?
- Essay vs Research paper
- The best way to grading an essay
- How to plan an essay writing/contest
- How to write marketing essay/ graphic essay/ technical essay/Opinion essay/informal essay/interpretive essay/photography essay/character essay (one paragraph each for these type of essay)
- Participants should write the essay in easy to understand language with deep research on a selected topic. The essay should be written in the participant’s own language with interesting facts.
- How to focus on writing an essay
- How to write creative writing essays
- What is essay proofreading service
- How to write a cover page for an essay
- What are the best font for essays
- How to start an essay agency and providing essay editing jobs
