City garba venue eyeing world record

VADODARA: One of the city's famous garba venues is all set to make it to the Guinness Book of World Records (GBWR) soon. United Ways of Baroda (UWB) has approached the GBWR to get entry into the prestigious book of world records claiming that it hosted a record number of garba revellers at its venue during Navratri this year.
UWB authorities said that at no event in the world do lakhs of people gather at a single venue for such a long time."We have approached GBWR to register our venue's name for hosting largest number of revellers in Navratri. Thousands of revellers swayed to the tunes of garba at UWB ground this year that is much more than other venues," said Shivendersingh Chawla, chairman of resource mobilisation, UWB.
According to UWB authorities, over 25,000 revellers played garba every night at their venue located on Sarabhai premises near Sawarkar Chowk. The total number of revellers for all nine nights at UWB has been pegged at about 2.25 lakh. "It is a large number if compared to other dance festivals in the world. Hence, we have applied in the category of largest dance festival in the world. We had signed an agreement with GBWR and are confident that we will get the certificate soon," said Minesh Patel, chairman of UWB Garba Mahotsav.
"When we checked with GBWR, we found that the current record for average number of revellers in dance festival is 15,000. We have easily surpassed that figure. UWB garbas will soon achieve the unique feat," Patel added.
UWB has applied in 10 different categories that include largest number of viewers and decoration along with other arrangements. "Our collections have gone up by 30 per cent compared to last year and the sponsorship deals too have increased by 70 per cent. This shows that popularity of UWB has only increased this year," Chawla said.