NUAKHAI

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Context:  The Prime Minister has greeted the nation on the auspicious occasion of Nuakhai. 

Details:

• Nuakhai Juhar is an agricultural festival, also called Nuakhai Parab or Nuakahi Bhetghat.
• It is celebrated to welcome the new crop of the season.
• Nuakhai is a combination of two words that signifies eating of new rice as ‘nua’ means new and ‘khai’ means eat.
• This is the festival of Western Odisha, southern Chhattisgarh and adjoining areas of Simdega (Jharkhand).
• Its coastal counterpart is Nabanna, observed in Coastal Odisha.
• It is observed on panchami tithi (the fifth day) of the lunar fortnight of the month of Bhadrapada (August–September), the day after the Ganesh Chaturthi festival.
• Farmers offer the first produce from their lands to Goddess Samaleswari, the famous ‘Mother Goddess’ of Sambalpur district of Odisha.
• Sambalpuri dance forms like Rasarkeli and Dalkhai can be witnessed.
• Nuakhai festival traces its origin to the Vedic period in Panchyajna.

https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=1855884