Jambi, 4 Agustus 2025 – The 2025 Batanghari Jambi Festival once again became a cultural stage filled with cultural issues. On the second night of the event, the Bedeti Dance was performed by the Anak Dalam tribe from Dwi Karya Bakti Village, Pelepat District, Bungo Regency. The dance performance was also filled with storytelling and singing, which are characteristic of the Anak Dalam tribe.

The Bedeti dance was performed by female cadres of the Anak Dalam tribe, namely Juliana, Siska, Ita, Ratih, Induk Didi, and Induk Tuti. The six women performed dressed in cloth with leaf motifs as a philosophical symbol of life, tranquillity, and sustainability.

In the slow dance movements, a humming can be heard, which is part of the storytelling culture of the forest community. The lyrics contain prayers for the safety of nature and humans, reflecting an intimate and grateful relationship with the goodness of nature that has sustained human life.

The Batanghari Jambi Festival 2025, organised by the Jambi Province Culture and Tourism Office, will be held for five days from 2 to 9 August 2025 in the Batanghari Riverbank area, Jambi City. This annual event serves as a platform to showcase the rich arts, culture, and local wisdom of the Jambi community through traditional music and dance performances, craft exhibitions, regional culinary specialities, and cultural and ecotourism discussion forums.

This year, the Batanghari Festival carries the theme ‘The More Preserved, The More Prosperous’, as a means of campaigning and disseminating knowledge about the culture of Jambi.

Despite the rain, the event still commenced at 9 p.m. with great enthusiasm from the visitors. The presence of the Anak Dalam tribe on the main stage of the 2025 Batanghari Festival was a form of recognition of the life, knowledge and cultural expression of indigenous peoples. This was also the aim of the empowerment programme carried out by Pundi Sumatra with the support of Kemitraan Partnership for the recognition and involvement of indigenous peoples in public spaces, particularly the Anak Dalam tribe of Jambi.

In addition to performing the Bedeti dance, Juliana, a member of the Anak Dalam tribe, gave the audience goose bumps with the poem she recited. The poem raised the issue of environmental destruction, while also sharply criticising the government and concession owners who continue to clear the rainforest for their own personal gain.

‘The opportunity provided by the government at this major event shows that the government is very concerned about the cultures of the SAD community, one of which is the bedeti dance, which is on the verge of extinction,’ said Sutono, CEO of Pundi Sumatra. He also explained that this opportunity to perform was given directly by the Jambi Provincial Tourism Office to SAD cadres.