Assam's Big Bang Music Festival is rooted in community

Big Bang Music Festival, now in its sixth year, is hosted by the Dimasa, one of Assam's oldest indigenous communities

- Simanta Barman

For Daniel Langthasa, 40, and Avantika Roohi Haflongbar, 39, starting a music festival on wheels was a dream. A little over a decade ago, they entered their idea for a music festival that travelled across the Northeast in an entrepreneurship contest and won the first prize. Langthasa, a musician and activist, had toured India extensively with his band, Digital Suicide, and the couple wanted to offer similar exposure to musicians from the region. They envisioned a platform for cultural expression and exchange for the artists, but it didn't take off as they could not raise the seed money.

The couple did not give up and instead got the Dimasa community together to raise the funds to curate the Big Bang Music Festival in Assam. "We got married in 2015, and a year later in 2016, we kicked off this dream project of ours. So it is essentially a festival of love and hope," says Haflongbar.