A significant number of Monipuri indigenous people live in both Sylhet city and Moulvibazaar district in the Greater Sylhet region. Their main religious festival is Sri Sri Moharaashleela, popularly known as the raash festival. Though this festival is organized in Monipuri Royal Palace in Sylhet city, it is celebrated at Madhabpur and Adampur under Komalganj Upazilla in Moulvibazaar in an even grander manner.

Celebrated since 1769, the raash festival has attracted not only the Monipuri community but people from diverse religious backgrounds as well. Puja pavilions are decorated in a multitude of colours. Monipuri children treat themselves to ‘cowboy’ dance by the day, while at night smartly attired young women from the same indigenous community indulge in raash dance reflecting on the saga of Sri Krishna and Sri Radha as pictured in the Mahabharata.

The raash festival is organized on the full-moon night of the Bengali month of Karthrik. Anyone visiting Sylhet at this time can pay a visit to the Monipuri Royal Palace as well as Monipuri-inhabited areas of Shibganj and Masimpur for a first-hand experience of the Monipuri raash festival.

How To Go

MouluviBazar can be reached by train via sreemangal . From sreemangal railway station, anyone can take a Jeep or CNG to reach the Komalganj. Anyone intent on participating in the raash festival in the rural areas of Madhabpur or Adampur can easily travel from Sreemongol via Komalganj.