Pune: Just like every year, the amazing images of Wari from Indrayani river to Chandrabhaga river and also of Palkhi procession starting from Alandi to Pandharpur clicked by the photographers were out on display at a three-day exhibition which was held at Balgandharva auditorium. Mrunal Pawar, Director Sakal Media Group and Madhusudan Tawade, senior faculty in Bharati Vidyapeeth School of Photography were present for the closing ceremony and distributed prizes to the winners.
The legacy of almost 10 years of photography competition continued as Sakal Social Foundation in collaboration with the sponsors Bharati Vidyapeeth School of Photography and Cinematography and Shristi Digilife held the competition. More than 100 participants across Maharashtra participated in it. The exhibition of the selected pictures was held at Balgandharva Kaladalan till August 14.
Bharati Vidyapeeth University has been the sponsor from the last three years.
The participants who participated in this event had submitted around 15,000 photographs, from which only 1,500 photographs got selected and were displayed at the exhibition. The photographers travelled along with the Warkaris and captured everything about the Wari including the emotions of the Warkaris, expression of the children participating in the Wari along with beautiful landscapes, the bliss enjoyed by Warkaris in the crowd and many more such things during the Palkhi procession at Alandi, Dive Ghat and Pune city.
The participants submitted their entries for the competition online, and there was no entry fee. Mukund Parkhe won the first prize, while Shridhar Palange and Nitin Patil won the second and third prizes respectively.
Speaking on the occasion, Pawar said, “The purpose of this Wari exhibition is to bring the essence of Wari to the public. This exhibition brings alive special moments, unflinching devotion and boundless energy of the Warkaris for the people to see and experience. Also, various photographers, amateur or professional; anyone with a phone in their hand with no prior experience can participate in it at no additional cost. It has grown gradually for the past 10 years and this year, we received 15,000 photos out of which 1,500 were chosen with the theme of 'portrait photography'. Our aim is simple – to bring people closer through this community and promote the living tradition especially amongst the youth."
The photographs were selected by Tawade and his team. Tawade said, “This year we not only selected the photographs from the technical aspect but also those photographs which depicted message and social cause. For a photograph to be perfect it should contain perfection in the technical aspect, a subject should matter, a message to society and overall presentation.”
Winners speak
Winner of the contest, Mukund Parkhe said, “Photography has been my hobby for a very long time and for the first time I have participated in this competition. I have tried to capture the emotions and positive vibes of the Warkaris, because it is not that easy to walk along all the way from their respective villages to Pandharpur.”
Palange said, “I used to travel in wari from Pune to Saswad only. But this year I had walked all the way till Pandharpur with the Warkaris. The prize received for my photograph depicts selfie with god, as my aim was to capture 'safest and blessed selfie with god'. Because nowadays we hear negative news about selfies, so I had tried to capture a positive perception about the selfie.”
Patil said, “From last 20 years I have been into photography. While I was travelling through Wakhari village, I saw a young boy who was the resident of the village, enjoying the wari and the devotional songs which made me capture the lively photograph.”
