Girls from Rung tribe performing on bollywood number

People from Rung community have sharp features and are of short height. The people are quite hospitable and simple in their living. These people have been living in the surrounding mountains of Dharchula valley since ages. In early times, people used to live in surrounding hills during the summer season and hibernate to the green valley of Dharchula in winters to beat the extremely cold weather at the high altitudes. Gradually the people started getting used to live in the relatively warmer climate of the valley and that's how the place became a permanent ground for the people once hibernating there. Tents and wooden houses soon changed into houses of brick and mortar. What started as a small stop over place in the early 1900s had developed to a full grown town by 1990s.

The town not only provides a permanent shelter to the regional people, but also a resting place to traders and pilgrims who cross the town in order to reach their destinations far ahead. This growing crowd was a start of the trend which lay the foundation of Dharchula's commercialization. With passing time, people from different parts of the plains and foothill areas started settling in Dharchula to tap the commercial opportunities of the area. Although the majority of the population in Dharchula still consists of Rung people, there are lot other sects of people too, like Punjabis, Baniyas, etc.


Kangdali Festival is a festival held by the rung tribe of the Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand. This festival coincides with the blooming of the Kandali plant, which flowers once every twelve years. It is held in the Chaudas Valley between August and October. The legend of the Kandali Festival comes a folklore, which tells of a boy who died upon applying the paste of the root from a shrub known as Kang-Dali on his boil. Enraged, his widowed mother cursed the shrub and ordered the Shauka women to pull up the root of the Kang-Dali plant off its ground upon reaching its full bloom, which happens once in twelve years. Since then, a victory dance is performed every twelve years upon the decimation this shrub in its blooming period. The women with lead the procession, each armed with a ril, a tool which was used


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