The South Asian community in Kingston are celebrating Holi, an annual festival that honours the arrival of spring and marks the end of winter.
Commonly known as “the festival of colour”, the festival is rooted in Hindu mythology.
The ancient celebration often involves throwing coloured powder, sharing food and coming together as a community.
In honour of the festival, Namaste Kingston, a community-led non-profit organisation, held their third Rangotsav celebration. The event included 10 food stalls, a live DJ, performances, a 360 photobooth as well as traditional colour play.
“There’s a wider, powerful message behind this that people often ignore and they just go for the ah, this is about fun. We are just playing with colour. But it is more than colour play, it’s about community,” explained founder, director and treasurer of Namaste Kingston, Madhur Hemnai.
“It is more about unity and inclusion to say look, it doesn’t matter what religion you come from, what ethnicity you come from or what social strata you come from, you get coloured in all different colours and come together.”
Kingston has a significant and growing Asian population with a 2025 CQC assessment finding that 17.81% of Kingston-Upon-Thames residents identify as Asian.
Kingston University is no different, with a 2023 Student Equality data report finding that students with Asian heritage take up the highest percentage of the student population
Hemnai continued, “We encourage the local community to take part, so we saw performances from local communities, young kids, adults who would like to showcase some of their skills and amateur performances in music and dance. Lots of food store owners showcase their foods from across a variety of continents. So, from north, south, east, west, everywhere. We try to bring everyone together.”