Medaram Jathara

🔆 Medaram Jathara

✅ Asia’s largest tribal festival started with enormous traditional vigour experiencing a large number of pilgrims and devotees from all across the country.

♻️ The Medaram Jathara:

✅ It is the second-largest fair in India after Kumbh Mela and is celebrated by the Koya tribe of Telangana. 

✅ The celebration continues for four days.

✅ This festival is with the objective of honouring the goddesses Sammakka and Saralamma. Saralamma was the daughter of Sammakka. 

✅ It is celebrated once every two years in the month of Magha (February) on the full moon day. 

✅ The idol of Saralamma is installed in the temple at Kannepalli, a small village near Medaram. 

✅ The rituals are performed by the Koya priests called Kaka Vaddes.

♻️ Traditional music is played with: 

🔸 Doli – cylindrical drum

🔸 Akkum – Brass blowing instrument

🔸 Thootha Kommu – Bison horn blowing instrument

🔸 Cymbals

✅ This celebration has been supported by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs along with proactive measures to promote and preserve tribal traditions. 

♻️ About the Koya Tribes:

✅ They constitute a very unique way of community life and a common cultural heritage. 

✅ Koyas are identified as a warrior tribe.

✅ They speak Odia and Telugu languages. 

✅ The last queen of Malkangiri named Bagaru Devi had a large Koya army with the help of which she defeated Ramachandra Deva III of Jeypore. 

✅ In 1880, during the British period, the Koya rebellion took place under the leadership of Koya youth Tama Dora. 

✅ They opposed the British government in many ways.

✅ The principal tribe is found in the Malkangiri district of south Odisha.

✅ They are also found in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Chattisgarh apart from Odisha. 

✅ Koyas are widely distributed in Kalimela, Mottu, Podia, Mathili and Kokonda blocks. 

✅ The Koyas of Malkangiri are ethno-culturally connected to Bison-horn Murias of adjacent Chhattisgarh. 

✅ They are known as Madia in the Sukuma region and Dorla in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh. 

✅ They are engaged in shifting cultivation and presently they indulge in settled cultivation. The major crops cultivated by the Koyas include paddy, maize, millet and tobacco leaf. 

✳️ Mains: Preserving the tribal tradition and culture