MANTHAN-SVK: Celebrating the significant but uncommon ‘Diwas’ or 'Jayanties' to sustain pious INDIAN fervour and culture

India is a land of varied cultures, traditions, festivals and fairs. But in the race to be westernized, we are forgetting our own significant heritage. It is these occasions which makes us meet our own very great history and respected personalities who are to be remembered forever and thus brings us all together to give us memories & happiness for lifetime.  

So Manthan- SVK has initiated an effort to restore and celebrate the forgotten and less celebrated festivals and days with the students of the SVK centre. The aim is to infuse the spirit of patriotism and impart the divine messages of holy saints of India. For this, jubilees and other important days are celebrated in the centre.

• GURU POORNIMA: In all our ancient scriptures Guru (The perfect Master) has been given the highest place in one’s life.  So to celebrate the pious festival, the students of Manthan SVK did Prayer. Teachers shared a few stories of Guru-Shishya relationship. Group meditation session was also organized.
   
• KARGIL VIJAY DIWAS: Named after the success of Operation Vijay, the students commemorated the martyrs of Kargil war by sharing the success stories of war, patriotic poems, small play and video session. Students painted national flag on their cheeks and hands. A drawing competition was also organized and the day ended with sweet distribution.
   
• FRIENDSHIP DAY: The first Sunday of August every year is celebrated as Friendship day, a day for celebrating friendship, the true essence of which can be seen in one of our epic, Shrimad Bhagwat Puran, where the story of the friendship of Lord Krishna and Sudhama is seen. Sharing this incidence, the students celebrated the day by making beautiful drawings and sketches, a small video on Friendship was also shown to students, to teach them the real meaning and being a loyal friend like Lord Krishna.
   
• TULSIDAS JAYANTI: Tulsidas ji was a great Indian poet-saint. On this day, students of SVK not only commemorated him but learned some of his great works like Dohavali, Hanuman Chalisa, Ramcharitmanasa and other stories from his life.
   
• RAKSHABANDHAN: The students made beautiful Rakhi from waste materials and tied on their brother’s wrist as a symbol of love and respect and in return the brothers promised to protect their sisters always from all evils. Interestingly, the real story behind this festival, which is not known to everyone, was shared about from where the festival originated.
   
• SANSKRIT DIWAS: Sanskrit is the mother of all languages. Even the scientists today hail Sanskrit to be the only perfect language. So, to celebrate the Sanskrit Diwas the student’s recited Shlokas and poems in Sanskrit. They also learned basic Sanskrit sentence formation and learned the greatness and recent studies on Sanskrit Language.

• SENIOR CITIZEN DAY: In the face of changing times there seems to be a tendency to regard senior citizens as unproductive and generally as burden to others.  The elders are vital part of a family as in their lives they’ve earned the knowledge and gratitude that is beneficial for the society and customs and also for a family as a whole.

Thus, Senior Citizens day is a perfect time for the children to learn why “Old is Gold” and how elders are the glue that binds the family together.  For this a theme based video session was organized and interactive session on how to take care and respect the elders was conducted. After all this, the students promised to take care of their grandparents and their parents in the years to come.

• JANAMSTAMI: For ages the world has been worshipping Lord Krishna on his birthday widely known as Janamstami. On this day Manthanites not only learned about the divine and multi-dimensional personality of Lord Krishna but also hidden meanings behind God’s divine plays were also told by their teachers. The students made Krishna mask and greeted each other.
   
• HINDI DIWAS: This day is served as a patriotic reminder for their common root and unity. Hindi being the mother tongue of Indians, is nowadays to be disapproved by everyone. Interesting competitions were organized in all SVK centers related to Hindi poems, stories, vocabularies etc., which aimed at promoting and propagating the Hindi Language.
   
• CHANDRASHEKAR AZAD AND BAL GANGADHAR TILAK JANMDIWAS: To mark the birth anniversary of these two brave freedom fighters; on 23^rd July, the students of Manthan SVK saw a couple of videos on how they fought for the freedom of India and sacrificed their life and youth for the sake of nation. Their bravery was applauded and respectfully commemorated by every student.