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Catch them young

Chinmaya Mission conducted a spectacular `Maatru puja' on its premises at Peda Waltair

MATRU PUJA kids performing pada puja to their mothers

Nothing epitomises the significance of mother better than the vedic quote `Maatrudevobhava' in the annals of human history. Of course, as usual it's easier said than done. However, in a bid to inculcate the spirit of this hoary quote among children, Chinmaya Mission conducted a spectacular `Maatru puja' on its premises at Peda Waltair. Surprisingly the event conducted as a part of a free summer camp was a big draw. It was a pleasant site of delight, nay, emotional ecstasy watching hundreds of children performing padapuja to their loving mothers. It acquires a high degree of significance in view of this stark reality of modern life wherein we find more and more children pushing their parents into oldage homes.

To drive home the point, a swamiji of the mission recites relevant slokas and make the children parrot it. Besides this noble event the summer camp featured many an interesting thing which the children enjoyed.

Apart from learning Guru stotram, Dasavatara stotram, performing pujas, children were taught simple values of Gita from Bhakti Yoga and Karma Yoga that have relevance for people of all ages, besides a number of bhajans by Brahmachari Prasada Chaitanya, the acharya of the camp.

In the fun and frolic section, children enacted skits from the great epics Ramayana and Mahabharata, general topics like traffic signals, railway station, rythu bazaar were also covered. Skits on use of Internet, watching television, junk food for which the children had to give the moral were also enacted with great poise. On the last day fancy dress and quiz were also conducted for children.

The camp served its purpose of providing an ideal ambience where in a child gets thorough grounding that kindles the spirit to blossom into a perfect one on vedic lines of value based life.

However, the unique "Maatru puja" is not without its lighter moments. While mothers seated with surging love in their beaming eyes as their loved offsprings offering pujas and showering petals - pushpakshatalu - the swamiji quipped with a smile, it's usual for mothers to shower akshatalu today it is the other way round, catching the dialectical nuances of akshatalu for scolding, one and all burst into laughter.

The Chinmaya Mission was formed in 1953 by renowned Swami Chinmayananda to spread the man-making knowledge of vedanta.

Swamiji believed that just as the strength of a wall depended on the quality of each brick, so too the health of a society depended on the individuals. If individuals are healthy, the society is healthy. His strategy for building a new society was to "Catch 'em young" and his mission unceasingly works for it and its Vizag Chapter is no exception.

PUSHPA BHARGAVA

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