“Look out!” calls out farmer P Srinivasan and I move just in time to avoid a bull that was curiously sniffing my dress. “You have to be watchful here,” he chuckles. The Kannapuram Mariamman Temple Cattle Festival is not the usual village fair in which you stroll through carefree. Rearers and breeders of Kangayam cattle bring their animals to be sold at the famed annual festival at Olapalayam, a village in Tiruppur district, 82 kilometres from Coimbatore. People from across Tamil Nadu, especially Madurai, Theni, Ramanathapuram, Pudukottai, and Tiruchi visit the festival to buy cattle for jallikattu, agriculture and farm work, as well as for dairy.
The cattle fair is part of the temple’s car festival that is 15 days long. According to RP Palanikumar, a local seller who used to be in the temple committee, the festival can be estimated to be over 1,000 years old. On day four of the festival when we visit, there are over 10,000 cattle for sale displayed on 70 acres of farmland.
