Went to India International Trade Fare (IITF) on Sunday, the trade fare is being held at Pragati Maidan (New Delhi) for the 27th consecutive year.

Since it was a Sunday, I was expecting a mad rush at the trade fare. However the rush was much more than what I had expected and we had to actually stand in line for almost an hour to enter Pragati Maidan!

Once inside we thought we wouldn’t come across any more queues, however we were taken aback when saw another long queue, this time in front of the Gujarat state pavilion. Even though pavilion looked quite good from the outside, we decided to skip it and went to the Jammu & Kashmir pavilion which was less crowded. In fact this time around we decided to concentrate more on the state pavilions.

Here is a list of pavilions we managed to see in five hours we were at the trade fare.

1. Jammu and Kashmir
2. Himachal
3. West Bengal
4. Karnataka
5. Rajasthan
6. Assam
7. Andhra Pradesh
8. Nagaland
9. Bihar
10-13 Good Living
14-15 Electronics and small industry

It wasn’t like we were rushing through these pavilions, in fact in most of the state pavilions we spent quite bit of time shopping. We did however rush through the electronics one, since we weren’t looking for any new gadget/appliances.

While my sister indulged in a bit of shopping at the state pavilions, I on the other hand was more than satisfied with having tasted various cuisines like Litti Chokha from Bihar, Idli - Sambar and Kesari Bhaat from Karnataka, Momos from Assam, Sandesh from West Bengal and for the grand finale, stupendous Rajasthan thali containing Rice, Bajre ki roti, chana dal poori, Dal-Baati, Gatte ki Sabzi, Kardhi, Churma, Mung Dal ka halwa, papad, salad and achar.

It was an exhausting evening, however in spite of all the shoving and waiting in line to first enter the trade fare and then to enter the Metro station we enjoyed the trade fare quite a bit. Hats off to the authorities for maintaining order despite having to tackle such a large crowd.

As for me, this is just the beginning with Auto Expo in January, Surajkund Mela in February and couple of photo expos in between, it is just the start to a winter full of fun.

Here are few photos from the IITF

Gujarat pavilion

Karnataka pavilion

Rajasthan pavilion

Ma Durga at a folk show in front of West Bengal pavilion

Scale model of Charminar in Andhra Pradesh pavilion