Students take part in the poster-making competition at Shri Krishna Science Centre in Patna on Monday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

Patna, Feb. 28: Around 600 students from all districts of the state assembled at Shri Krishna Science Centre to mark National Science Day today.

The celebrations, which started around 8.30am, comprised competitions on slogan-writing, poster-making, essay writing and elocution. The students took out a march to Gandhi Maidan and back to Shri Krishna Science Centre.

Anjani Kumar Singh, principal secretary, human resource development department, flagged off the march from the centre in the presence of Rajesh Bhushan, the project director of Bihar Education Project Council. The students from around 65 schools, government and private, went around Gandhi Maidan holding banners and placards, which read “Science is boon for life” and “Try to foster the positive development through science”, in their hands.

Students gave innovative entries for the slogan-writing competition, which has three different themes — science for humanity, biodiversity and moral values in science education. Twelve-year-old Saket Kumar of Multipoint Science Club, Fatuha, Patna, showcased his maturity with his slogan “Science is an adventure which is bringing the destruction of humanity”.

The poster-making competition also defined the spirit of the small wonders as they banked on their memory to draw pictures of C.V. Raman and Marie Curie. The themes in the competition were ‘International year of chemistry’, ‘Life and works of Madam Curie’ and ‘Life and works of C.V. Raman’. The themes for the essay writing and elocution competition were ‘Chemistry in daily life’ and ‘Women in science’ respectively.

Anurag Kumar, the project co-ordinator of Shri Krishna Science Centre, said: “The central government has announced February 28 as National Science Day in honour of Indian scientist C.V. Raman, who discovered the Raman effect on this day in 1928. He became the first Asian scientist to receive the Nobel Prize in 1930. The National Council of Science Museums of which Shri Krishna Science Centre is a constituent unit, celebrates this day to commemorate the discovery of the Raman effect.

“This year, we have organised the event in collaboration with the State Council of Education Research and Training and Science for Society, Bihar. We are celebrating 2011 as the International Year of Chemistry in recognition of the completion of 100 years of Marie Curie receiving the Nobel Prize,” added Kumar.