Colorful celebrations held to mark Bengali New Year in Bangladesh

Hundreds of thousands of people in Bangladeshi capital Dhaka Sunday participated in a mega colorful procession featuring evocative masks, floats and motifs of Bangladeshi culture, reported Xinhua.

The procession greeted Pohela Boishakh, or the first day of the New Year, with renewed hope and good spirits.

With a combination of traditional and modern ritual practices, people here celebrated the Bengali New Year 1431.

People wearing traditional costumes joined the procession called the Mangal Shobha Jatra that kicked off from Dhaka University following the conclusion of a flagship curtain-raising cultural event at dawn in the city's Ramna park with the musical soiree of Chhayanaut, a leading cultural organization of the country.

Students of Dhaka University's Institute of Fine Arts have coordinated the procession to welcome the Bengali New Year.

This year's procession featured five motifs, represented by a large-scale replica of a horse alongside other handcrafted clay figurines and traditional artefacts, all of which were made by Dhaka University students and their teachers.

In Bangladesh, Pohela Boishakh, or the first day of the New Year, is a national holiday.