Manja

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Cotton threads being coloured and glass-coated.

Manja (or manjha), is the abrasive string used with fighter kites in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Chile, India, Nepal and Pakistan. It is gummed, coloured and coated with powdered glass. In Brazil, the mix of glue and powered glass is called "cerol".

Kites are fought all throughout the year and during special kite flying festivals in the region. Two fighters will entangle the glass powder coated manja while flying their kites in the sky and try to cut off the string of each others kites by pulling it.

The winner's kite keeps flying while the loser's kite gets cut and drifts away with the wind. Children and/or adults run after a cut kite and try to capture it when it falls to the ground, a practice called kite running.

A modern recipe

A kite shop in Lucknow, India

People preparing and applying Manja to the Kite thread, Dhaka, Bangladesh

Traditional recipes use rice gluten, tree gums and similar natural ingredients, and the exact recipe is often a closely guarded secret of the individual maker. By contrast this is a modern recipe used by some in Tamil Nadu:

Ingedients:

• finely powdered glass
• industrial adhesive such as "Vajram"
• maida flour
• aluminum oxide, abrasive
• zirconia alumina, abrasive
• coloring

The water is boiled with the addition of vajram, to which is added a paste of maida and finely powdered glass pieces to make a thick colloidal solution and the abrasives are added. The colouring is added, while stirring is continued to make a thick paste without the sedimentation of the glass and abrasives.

Threat to birds and human life

Manja can be extremely deadly to birds flying in the sky and to humans.

Many people also get seriously injured and lose their lives when they fall off rooftops when flying and fighting kites and handling the manja reels and vigorously pulling or releasing it during battle of the kites. In the Indian subcontinent kites are generally flown and fought from the rooftops of houses.

Kite running is the practice of running after drifting kites in the sky that have been cut loose in battle with other kites. Several kite runners die each year gazing up and running after kites as they are so fixated on the drifting kites in the sky that they run into the path of oncoming traffic and trains without looking down or fall from trees and buildings which they were trying to scale to get at kites that landed on top.

Others gravely endanger their lives when they walk around in the middle of congested towns and cities facing up with their eyes fixed on fighting kites in the skies, the excitement to see which of the fighting kite wins and which one loses sometimes makes people dangerously unaware of what is happening on the ground in their immediate surroundings causing injuries and collisions with traffic.

See also

• Kite
• Kite fighting
• Uttarayan, The kite flying festival of northern India
• Kite running, the practice of running after and catching kites drifting in the sky which have been cut loose in battle with other kites

References

• Banned Chinese manja still on sale; by Kumar Manish, TNN; 6 January 2010; Times of India
• Manja market flying low! 15 Dec 2006, Rajat Ghai , TNN, The Times of India
• Docs flock to save winged victims, 10 Jan 2008, Radha Sharma , TNN, Times of India
• Vulture worries stalk activists on Uttarayan, 14 Jan 2007, TNN, The Times of India
• Vets to heal birds this Uttarayan, 5 Jan 2006, Radha Sharma , TNN, The Times of India
• Soaring kites ground at least 600 winged souls, 15 Jan 2005, TNN, The Times of India
• Uttarayan cuts short six lives, 16 Jan 2004, TNN, The Times of India
• 10-year-old boy dies chasing kite, 14 Jan 2008, TNN, The Times of India
• Celebrate... but with compassion, 12 Jan 2004, JHUMARI NIGAM , TNN, The Times of India
• Pakistan tackles killer kites: Kite flyers in Pakistan's Punjab Province will face murder charges and a possible death penalty if their sharpened strings cause more deaths. By Shahid Malik, BBC, BBC correspondent in Lahore, Tuesday, 10 June, 2003
• Many birds fall prey as kites rule skies, 15 Jan 2003, TNN, The Times of India