LAHORE, March 12: Lahorites and their guests, who came from all over the country and abroad, could not resist the temptation to fly kites after Saturday midnight and flouted the ban till sunset on Sunday.

This time round only one-third of the kites were seen on the skies compared to the shows in the last couple of years in the Walled City, Gowalmandi and on Nisbet Road areas. The situation in other parts of the Punjab capital was different.

The hide-and-seek between police and the kite buffs continued till 2am on Sunday during which cellular phones were used to alert friends and relatives to a raid.

It seemed that the fireworks show at the three famous havelis where dinner receptions, musical and dance parties for the elite were arranged on Saturday night, motivated people to come to their rooftops as a number of enthusiasts restored to firing in the air in Walled City areas soon after it.

With a break from 4.30am to around 11am, the kite enthusiasts remained busy in shouting “Bo Kata” till they bade farewell to the festival by flying big kites of up to 10 taawa, exploding fireworks and restoring to aerial firing at sunset on Sunday.

Reports of use of loudspeakers, drums and pressure horns, and aerial firing poured in from localities like Shadbagh, Mahmood Booti, Wassanpura, Baghbanpura, Singhpura, Chamra Mandi, Tezab Ahata, Faiz Bagh, Misri Shah and Badami Bagh besides Sanda, Ichhra, Sabzazar, Gulshan-i-Ravi, Nawankot, Sherakot, areas across the Bund Road, Samanabad, Iqbal Town, Faisal Town and parts of Township and Green Town.

A good number of people were seen on their rooftops in these localities, especially in the afternoon in spite of the cloudy weather and a nip in the air.

People also started thronging recreational parks, especially the Racecourse Park, where Jashan-i-Baharan had been organised in the afternoon. The Gulshan-i-Iqbal and Bagh-i-Jinnah, too, had more visitors than they have on Sundays and other holidays.

Bread vendors on Wahdat Road and at Ichhra and Mozang said orders for qeemaywala and roghni naan were as these used to be on every Basant in the last couple of years.

All shutters in the two wholesale markets of kites and thread in Mochi Gate and Baghbanpura remained down. A majority of traders in streets and minor arteries of the city had removed the stock from their shops but were supplying the kites and thread, wrapped in bedsheets, to their permanent customers and acquaintances.

Aerial firing and use of metal wire by kite flyers resulted in power breakdowns, followed by water supply suspension in many parts of the city, especially in northern Lahore areas.

The Lesco authorities reported a total of 2,410 trippings during the last 24 hours.

“There were 150 minor trippings daily on an average in the city before the lifting of the ban. The system suffered a total of 1,825 minor and 49 major trippings on Sunday alone which caused a loss of Rs420 million to the system,” a Lesco spokesman said late in the evening.

“The loss to the electronic goods owing to power breakdowns and trippings must be in millions,” he said.

Last Sunday, the system suffered a total of 2,100 trippings, causing a loss of Rs390 million, he said.

Power supply remained suspended for less than 20 minutes in minor and from two to four hours in major trippings, the latter involving 132-KV grids which was very dangerous for the system, said the Lesco spokesman.

The Supreme Court had on Dec 9 prohibited kite flying and ordered the closure of the related business in view of the deaths of people caused by razor-sharp twine or metal wire, mainly in Lahore.

The ban on production, sale and flying of kites was formally lifted by the CDGL on Feb 25 initially for 14 days under the directions of the apex court. The CDGL issued licences for manufacture and sale of kites under the provisions of the Punjab Dangerous Kite-flying Prohibition Ordinance.

The licences were to become invalid on March 15, following an extension granted by the apex court on the request of the Punjab government. The chief minister had on March 10 reimposed the ban for an indefinite period.

Around 550 people have lost their lives since 1995 in related incidents.