Students of DPS Ruby Park perform at their annual day on April 25. Picture by Anindya Shankar Ray

Delhi Public School, Ruby Park, held its annual prize distribution day on April 25 at the Science City auditorium.

Titled Reverence, it had Roopendra Narayan Roy, the managing director of accounting firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, India, as the chief guest. After a welcome song by the choir, Principal Anushree Ghosh delivered a report on the previous academic session.

The programme began with a musical presentation, titled Arabian Dream, arranged by the music teachers and performed by 35 students. Shreyas Agarwal of Class X played the guitar as part of the orchestra, a fusion of instruments including the violin, bass guitar, drums, keyboard and sarod, sitar, tabla and maracas, a Puerto Rican percussion instrument.

“Although I had a busy schedule, I stayed back after school to practise. It was a difficult performance for both teachers and students. The various parts of the orchestra were rehearsed separately and brought together later,” Shreyas explained.

The high point of the event was the play, Our Beloved Bapuji. Over 900 students from classes II to X participated in the 45-minute play that looked back on Mahatma Gandhi’s achievements and contrasted it with the present condition of the country.

It included flashbacks of Gandhi’s struggle, beginning from his work in South Africa to the Dandi march and his reaction to the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre along with scenes from contemporary India, like the Godhra carnage.

Next up was a group dance on the various seasons, incorporating classical, folk and western forms, performed by almost 400 children from classes II to X. “We depicted spring as the love between Radha and Krishna,” said Geetali Bose, the dance teacher.

Said Smita Salejee, mother of Class X student Aman: “The kids did a great job with the play. The scenes were well-written and the voice-overs were perfectly in sync.”