Few cultural events in Pakistan evoke memory, nostalgia, and civic longing the way Basant does in Lahore. For almost two decades, its absence has been a sore wound. For my generation, it has been a painful reminder every year of how our country’s ruling class has enabled religious extremism and of the complete failure of governance that made joy and innocent celebration dangerous enough to criminalise.
From the 1980s onward, the religious right consistently denounced Basant as a “Hindu festival”, arguing that because of its pre-Islamic and syncretic origins, it was un-Islamic—a ridiculous argument rooted in ignorance and the politics of branding anything “Hindu” as Indian, Pakistan’s imagined civilisational other.
This manufactured moral panic steadily narrowed the space for cultural plurality. Now that the Punjab government has formally revived Basant under a new regulatory regime, the city is filled with unprecedented delight, elation, and enthusiasm—one of those moments when those of us living outside Pakistan yearn to experience it first-hand. So many memories, so much context swelling in one’s mind.
For Lahoris, especially those raised in the Walled City or the older, denser neighbourhoods kite flying was not merely a pastime; it was a pulse of life itself. For children of my generation growing up in the 1980s, Basant sat at the intersection of longing and prohibition.
The religious right may have condemned it as a “Hindu” ritual, but there were other, quieter pressures too. Middle-class parents in civil service or academia like mine saw kite flying as a frivolous indulgence, lacking intellectual merit and far too risky for “good children”. Yet the same reservations never applied to cricket or other elite-coded sports.
So kite flying lived in our imaginations as a forbidden, working-class joy (with the perceived deliciousness of a sin)—something our domestic staff’s children did effortlessly while we watched from balconies, absorbing their triumphs every time a victorious “aai bo kaata!” pierced the sky. And still, the cultural magnetism of Basant was irresistible.
Even my orthodox, conservative parents, who would never allow us to host Basant gatherings or hold a patang ourselves, could not deny us the music and magic of the festival when others invited us. My mother would get me a peela jora—the Basant-coloured yellow outfit—every year, which I accessorised with fresh rose-flower jewellery handmade by my mother. Those were the days.
To understand how Basant became vulnerable to bans, one must revisit the long arc of state–religion complicity in Pakistan
By the 1990s, Basant had transformed from a daytime pursuit into an all-night urban carnival music, dancing, rooftop-hopping, laughter echoing across neighbourhoods. My husband, Sirmed Manzoor, and I spent many Basant nights drifting from one rooftop to another until dawn, returning home at six or seven in the morning, our hearts full and our ears ringing with joy.
We even hosted our own celebrations in those early years, before things began to turn, before commercialisation intensified, crowds grew unruly, and the festival we loved began to slide into dangerous excess that neither the state nor society managed responsibly.
To understand how Basant became vulnerable to bans, one must revisit the long arc of state–religion complicity in Pakistan. Throughout the 1980s, religious groups emboldened by the ideological engineering of the Zia era were systematically empowered to police public morality. Their objections were rarely theological and almost always about control.
When the BBC and CNN were permitted in 1989, the clerical lobby erupted in street protests, accusing these news channels of bringing fohāshi and uryāni vulgarity and nudity into Pakistani homes. The same script was deployed against Basant year after year, with clerics denouncing it as a Hindu ritual, despite kite flying being a centuries-old, shared tradition across Punjab, transcending religion and borders.
The political class, insecure and often complicit, rarely confronted this intolerance. Successive governments distanced themselves from Basant—not because it threatened public order, but because they feared backlash from a religious right the state itself had nurtured. Thus, cultural space shrank not organically but through deliberate ideological intimidation.
Yet despite this suffocating climate, Lahore pushed back with a defiance only Lahoris could muster. In the 1990s, Basant did not just survive; it flourished. Rooftops across the Walled City shimmered in yellow, and the festival became a symbol of Lahore’s cosmopolitan character—an antidote to the intolerance gathering force in the country. Even as Pakistan oscillated between rivalry, diplomacy, and hostility towards India, Lahore warmly welcomed Indian artists, journalists, and friends. Basant became a cross-border cultural bridge.
What was meant to be a collective reclaiming of joy has once again been marred by the very forces of religiously framed violence that have repeatedly intruded into Pakistan’s civic life
Pakistan’s elite, diaspora families, and international guests flocked to rooftop parties, many of them corporate-sponsored. The festival became increasingly commercialised, with multinational brands, celebrities, and high-profile hosts—most famously Mian Yousaf Salahuddin (Mian Salli) turning Basant nights into spectacular cultural performances. His haveli, decked in yellow lights, became a meeting ground for the who’s who of Pakistan and, occasionally, India—including unforgettable nights when Bollywood personalities such as Shatrughan Sinha joined the festivities. This was Lahore at its best: flamboyant, welcoming, and proudly multicultural, even in the face of extremist pushback.
But as the 1990s bled into the post-9/11 era, Pakistan underwent a dark transformation. Violent extremism intensified, and the state’s capacity to regulate anything—from madrassahs to militant networks to kite-string production—collapsed. The religious right grew louder in its denunciations, and simultaneously, the festival itself became perilous.
The commercialisation of kite flying introduced a ruthless competitive edge: chemically coated string, crushed-glass manjha, metal wire, aerial firing, reckless rooftop climbing, and fatal accidents involving electricity poles. Children riding motorcycles with their parents were especially vulnerable—several lost their lives when lethal strings slashed their throats. It was a gruesome failure of regulation and public awareness.
Ironically, it was a military dictator, General Pervez Musharraf, who attempted to revive Basant in the early 2000s as a showcase of Pakistan’s “soft image” to the world. For a few years, the government actively patronised the festival. Yet the structural flaws remained unaddressed, and by 2005, after a series of horrific deaths, the state resorted to the bluntest instrument in its repertoire: a blanket ban. What had once been a joyful spring ritual became another casualty of extremism, negligence, and misplaced priorities.
This year, however, Basant’s return carried a distinctly political imprint. Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif revived the festival with full fervour—embedding the long-ignored regulatory architecture that should have existed decades ago. Her administration introduced licensing requirements for vendors, strict bans and penalties against hazardous string, digital traceability of kites, safety protocols for riders, zoning and rooftop guidelines, and an unprecedented deployment of surveillance and enforcement teams across Lahore.
Crucially, this revival unfolded with the full backing of the military establishment. The same state that once capitulated to clerical pressure now appeared united in supporting a cultural festival long demonised by the religious right. And because the establishment stood firmly behind the provincial government, the usual moral policing evaporated.
No fiery Friday sermons, no denunciations of “Hindu festivals”, no mobilised street protests—just a rare and welcome quiet. For a moment, it felt as though Pakistan had finally begun to reclaim the cultural space it had long surrendered to reactionary forces.
But today’s devastating terrorist attack in an Islamabad mosque—striking worshippers during Friday prayers and killing dozens—has cast a long, brutal shadow over that optimism. In response, the Punjab Chief Minister has cancelled all major Basant events scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, the festival's final two days.
What was meant to be a collective reclaiming of joy has once again been marred by the very forces of religiously framed violence that have repeatedly intruded into Pakistan’s civic life. The abrupt cancellation is a sobering reminder that extremism still retains the power to fracture public space and silence festivity, even at a moment when the state finally seemed willing to stand up to it.
And so, Lahore’s kites fall back to earth—not because the wind failed, but because Pakistan’s long struggle against forces that fear joy more than death is still far from over.