Majuli Ras Leela Festival Guide

3 min readSep 5, 2019

The festive season begins with Janmashtami and ends with Diwali. In between, we welcome Ganesha, worship Durga, dance for nine nights, burn Ravan effigy and reenact Ramlila. Just as the rest of India brings an end to the festivities, the largest river island in the world starts preparing for its biggest festival — the Majuli Ras Leela Festival.

Majuli Island in Assam is a complex amalgamation of Vaishnavite sects and indigenous customs. The island is home to five tribal groups — Mising, Deori and Kacharis. Each of these tribes has a very rich culture, diverse cuisine, vivid practices and their own languages. To add to the cultural cocktail, Srimanta Shankardeva, a social reformer and Vaishnavite scholar, arrived in Majuli in the 16th century. He introduced the local tribes to Lord Krishna and Vaishnavite ideologies.

Today, there are numerous Sattras in Majuli preaching the same ideologies and contributing to the culture of the island via literature, dramas, plays, dance, music, paintings, handicrafts and other artworks. It is difficult to experience the art and culture of all the different Sattras in a few days. However, for those who want to experience and understand the glorious cultures of Majuli, there is hope.

Majuli Raas Leela Festival 2023

**Masks worn during Majuli Ras Leela Festival**

Every year, in the third week of November, Majuli hosts the Raas Leela Festival. This festival is a celebration of 500 years of cultural and artistic contributions of the various Sattras and the diverse tribal traditions. Medieval saint Srimanta Sankardev used dance dramas to share the stories of Lord Krishna with the tribals who didn’t understand the texts written in North Indian languages. In the earlier days, only Sattras’ monks and saints used to perform Raas.

That changed a few years ago and today locals participate alongside Sattra monks in the three-day festival and enact Lord Krishn’s life via songs, chants, folk dances, puppet shows and plays. Some participants live a life of austerity for a few days prior to the festival in order to gain full focus on their performances.

Some of the best enactments are — the birth of Krishna, Krishna herding cows in Gokul, childhood pranks, Makhan Chori (stealing clarified butter) and his killing of demons such as Bakasur, Kaliya and Kans. Bhaona dramas, where performers wear masks made by monks, are very captivating. Another highlight is the classical Sattriya dance that can be witnessed at various Sattras. Raas Leela festival is a remarkable amalgamation of neo-Vaishnavite and Assam’s tribal culture.