May it be Republic Day or Independence Day or Makar Sakranti or Janamashtami, more and more people in north India are taking to kite flying on such days. In a way, kite flying is becoming a festival by itself. The Indian festival of Makar Sakranti is devoted to kite flying and fighting in some states. This year the festival was celebrated on January 14, with millions of people flying kites all over northern India.

The states of Bihar, Jharkhand, Gujarat, and some part of West Bengal, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and the cities of Ahemdabad, Baroda, Jaipur, Dhanbad and Hyderabad are particularly notable for their kite fighting festivals.

Kite flying in Hyderabad starts a month before the official kite flying festival (Sankranti). The thread used to fly kites in Hyderabad is known as '''Manjaa'.

Highly maneuverable single-stringed tissue paper and bamboo kites are flown from the rooftops while using line friction in an attempt to cut each other's kite lines, either by letting the line loose at high speed or by pulling the line in a fast and repeated manner.

India is observing every year 14th of January as kite flying day and is also known as uttarayan -  the name given to this day because it is this day from where the sun starts moving towards the uttar or north.

 Earlier, silk fabric was used as sail material for kites and fine, high-tensile-strength silk for flying line, and resilient bamboo for a strong, lightweight framework. Now silk fabric has been replaced with paper, nylon cloth, and polythene sheet.