Japanese Sumo Wrestling: Most popular event in Manipur Sangai festival 2018

M.N. Singh *

Sumo Wrestling at Sangai Festival at Khuman Lampak stadium, Imphal on November 22 2018 :: Pix - Lamdamba Oinam

Japan's National game Sumo Wrestling, which will conclude on November 25 2018 is counted as the most popular event of the Manipur Sangai Festival with audience even ready to buy ticket at black. Sumo Wrestling is added as a new event of the Manipur Sangai Festival only this year.

"The event is one of best ticket selling show", said an organiser. Pack audience at Indoor stadium Khuman Lampak were driven with excitement as Sumo Wrestlers showcase their skills.

The four day extravaganza – "Sumo Wrestling' event is being organised by Imphal based Salai Holdings Pvt Ltd. in association with Manipur Tourism Department at Khuman Lampak Indoor Stadium, Imphal. around Rs 2 crore were reportedly spend for bringing Sumo Wrestlers, said authority of the Salai Holdings.

Believe it or not, the Japanese Sumo Wrestler whom appeared in Dixcy Scott's latest advertisement Spandex, a superior elastic fibre as its USP of the brand is in Imphal associating the Sumo Wrestling, being a part of ongoing Manipur Sangai Festival. He and other four Sumo wrestlers will exhibiting the most popular martial art form of Japanese, Sumo Wrestling in KhumanLampak Indoor Stadium till 25, November.

Organisers claimed that they sold all the arranged seat capacity of the last showed matches at the rate ofRs 5000 for platinum seat, Rs 1000 for gold seat, Rs 500 for silver and Rs 200 for a gallery to the spectators.It has also faced difficulty and challenging to manage the most thrilling event of this season, saying that, they arranged 4,500 seats but all the tickets have been sold out of the last matches. Though, people are demanding tickets and have force to expand the seating capacity to 5,000.

Event spectators murmured while leaving the wrestling venue that it will strengthened the bond between Japan and Manipur in many aspects. "Witnessing Sumo Wrestling in Imphal is very exciting and life time memorable experience. Everyone has to applaud the initiatives taken up the government and other stakeholders" said Johny. People will definitely thrown up to at the concluding day of the Sumo Wrestling, he added.

Many foreign delegates including the Princes of Thailand are reportedly attending the festival and around 100 delegates from neighbouring Myanmar have already reached Imphal to witness the event. It may be mentioned that, Manipur Sangai Festival was debuted in 2010 with an objective to promote tourism to attract tourist and exposing the tourism potentials to the world.

The festival itself was named after the endangered Brow Antlered deer, Sangai, the state animal found only in the KeibulLamjao National Park, the only biggest floating national park in India. Unlike previous years, this time, the fest is being organised at five venues including Imphal, Senapati and Bishnupur districts of Manipur.

Sumo, Japanese martial art, is a form of competitive full-contact wrestling where a wrestler attempts to force his opponent out of a circular ring or into touching the ground with any body part other than the soles of his feet.