My childhood summers are filled with happy memories of Jhulan Pujo, a festival that felt less like a ritual imposed by elders and more like a play day. We were tasked with gently swinging Radha and Krishna on their decorated jhulan (swing), but our real mission was to sneak mishti from the offerings when the adults weren’t looking. We learned our epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, through stories told by our grandmother while playing and getting into mischief, so it never felt like a burden. I like to think children in Odisha still enjoy that same innocence, especially during festivals like Lanka Podi. They don’t just read or listen about Hanuman, they become him.
In Odisha, during the rains, people celebrate this unique festival, which remembers not the killing of Ravana by Ram but the burning of Lanka by Hanuman, the Monkey God. This is the story of Lanka Podi, a children’s festival that, sadly, many people don’t know about. At the heart of the celebrations is the Sonepur region of western Odisha, where the Tel River gently flows into the mighty Mahanadi. Every year, on the darkest night of the month of Bhadraba (August/September), children decorate a Hanuman on wheels, set its tail on fire, and race it through the streets. It is chaos, laughter, and wholesome fun.
But the festival begins at dawn, on a day when children don’t need to be coaxed into waking up early. Soon, the village streets come alive with little boys, their faces serious with concentration, pulling brightly painted wooden toys. Clattering horses and noble elephants are ceremoniously paraded through the dusty lanes. Meanwhile, the girls are immersed in their own work, arranging tiny, perfect clay pots and utensils, replicas of their mothers’ kitchens, decorating them with flower petals and delicate white patterns drawn in rice flour. It is a ritual of preparation, a passing down of wisdom through play.
As the sun sets, magic takes over. As darkness blankets Sonepur, the streets begin to twinkle with hundreds of dancing flames. Children as young as three grasp the ropes attached to their fiery chariots and pull them with beaming pride, their faces glowing in the firelight. It is a breathtaking illusion, the entire town looks as if it is ablaze, just like the legendary Lanka. For one night, these children are not merely playing, they are Hanuman, leaping across a kingdom, turning darkness into light.
In the potters’ quarters, the work begins about a month earlier. From the mud of the Mahanadi’s banks, skilled and practiced hands shape humble clay into the divine form of Hanuman. They sculpt fierce teeth, spiky crowns, and long, magnificent tails. “It is not a handle!” the potters always caution with a warm, knowing laugh. After their trial by fire, some idols are kissed with powdered mica, catching the light with a golden, ethereal sparkle. As the festival approaches, the clay Hanumans are fitted with wheels and decorated with leaves and bright yellow flowers. The next morning, the broken idols and later on the unsold ones are placed on rooftops as decoration. A tribute to this tradition can still be seen when sightseeing in Bhubaneswar (book a tour with us!).
Lanka Podi is more than a festival; it is a promise. A promise that in a rapidly changing world, some stories are too precious to be forgotten. They live on in the hands of a potter, the pride of a child, and the golden glow of a thousand miniature chariots on wheels.
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