Let’s use Ganeshotsav to spread the right message

Representation pic

Mumbai students took up themes such as tuberculosis and addiction with students spreading awareness about these social evils through street plays or ‘nukkad nataks'. They are performing outside Ganpati pandals and on crowded streets to create awareness.

The initiative is part of the yearly National Service Scheme run by Mumbai University and its affiliated colleges. Students have also been deployed at certain traffic hotspots across Mumbai for traffic control, guided by seniors.

The pandals and Ganesh festival on the whole is a great platform for sending a message, spreading awareness, getting people to think. When our youngsters are doing this, then they are perfect harbingers of change and influence.

In the past, too, we have seen pandals used as platforms for themes like organ pledging, blood donation, anti-drug use, communal harmony, and environmental awareness. Cheers to these messages and their disseminators. We would like to see festivals with their ready audience, the crowds, used in a two-pronged way. One, of course, is the devotion and worship; the second can be how to be of service to society. These have great power to effect transformation. People waiting in queues for ‘darshan' can imbibe the message. They may even have the time to think about it, as they wait, they can research wisely back home or even ask volunteers on site if there is something more to take away from here.

Mix festive fervour with responsibility, colours and crowds with consciousness. Make the ongoing 10 days a classroom, where one absorbs the good. More power to these pandals.