Rajasthan Kabir Yatra

Rajasthan Kabir Yatra is a travelling music festival which will journey over Rajasthan, creating a space where musicians, artists, scholars, students and seekers can immerse themselves in the voices of Bhakti and Sufi saint-poets such as Kabir, Mira, Bulleh Shah, questioning and dissolving boundaries of caste, class, religion and identity.

This Yatra takes its inspiration from the last two editions of the Rajasthan Kabir Yatra that took place in 2012-2016 and was widely chronicled and appreciated. Organised by Lokayan, this 3rd edition of Rajasthan Kabir Yatra is aiming to travel around Jodhpur and Barmer region partnering with Jodhpur Commissionerate Police, East District Jodhpur under the leadership of IPS Dr. Amandeep Singh Kapoor and Barmer's leading cultural organization Gramin Vikas Evam Chetna Sansthan, Barmer. This year it will bring more than 20 artists, over 300 yatris from other parts of India and abroad, together with thousands of local audiences.

The program consisted of film screenings of Hindi documentaries on Kabir along with music concerts by local Rajasthani singers as well as artists from outside the state, in different village locations en route. True to the tradition of the jaagran these performances carried on through the night into the early hours of the morning. An eclectic band of urban enthusiasts joined the Yatra, lending it a unique urban-rural flavor.

The Yatra is made possible through collaborations with local village mandalis, who commit a lot of time, energy and resources to host the artists, yatris and thousands of local rural audiences for the all-night program. In fact, the proposed 3rd edition of Yatra of 2017 is also in response to a strong demand from village and city folk (from different parts of Rajasthan), for a revisiting of the magic of the last two editions.

This year the Yatra will invite artists from Kutch, Malwa, Bengal, Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi, apart from several artists from Rajasthan itself, to share mystic songs in diverse musical genres. It will also showcase the work of painters, sculptors and photographers inspired by this tradition.