Lai Haraoba

Lai Haraoba is the oldest and most foundational ritual festival of the Meitei people of Manipur, predating the Vaishnavite Hinduism that arrived in the valley in the 15th century, and it remains the central living expression of Sanamahism, the indigenous Meitei religious tradition. The festival's name translates roughly to "merrymaking of the gods," and its purpose is to commemorate and re-enact the creation of the universe by Meitei deities, particularly Atiya Sidaba (also called Tengbanba Mapu). Unlike most Indian festivals, Lai Haraoba has no fixed calendar date: because the Meitei ritual calendar does not assign it a specific day, individual communities observe it any time between February and June, with the exact duration varying by tradition from three days to over three weeks. The festival is built around invoking and worshipping the umanglais, guardian deities associated with specific groves and localities, with as many as 364 umanglais collectively honoured across the full cycle of observances held throughout the state. Central to the festival are the Maibas and Maibis, male and female ritual specialists who function as priest-healers and mediums within Sanamahi tradition. The Maibis in particular perform Maibi Jagoi, a solo dance considered to channel divine power directly, believed to invoke the blessings of the Lais and offer protection against malevolent forces. Alongside this priestly performance, the community dance Thabal Chongba, also seen during Yaoshang, is performed here in its original ritual context, with dancers' circular formation understood to re-enact the primordial act of creation itself. Lai Haraoba's ritual sequence walks through symbolic stages of world-making: the creation of the earth, the forming of living beings, the construction of the first houses, and the origins of agriculture and food. For scholars and visitors alike, it offers one of the clearest surviving windows into pre-Vaishnavite Meitei cosmology, still actively practised rather than reconstructed from historical record.