A school hosted a fest to help students understand the values enshrined in the Preamble to the Constitution of India.
At Mahadevi Birla World Academy, the junior inter-school literary festival held this week was titled Practising the Preamble.
The objective, teachers said, was to enable children to understand the meaning of equality, liberty, justice, acceptance and coexistence as values to counter intolerance and violence.
The festival for Classes III, IV and V had participants from 12 other schools and the events were centred around the values contained in the Preamble.
The festival also celebrated Leila Seth’s book We, the Children of India, which simplifies some of these concepts for children.
“We have to teach our children to coexist, accept differences and stand for and by each other despite differences. Even if a person is different, they have to be treated with dignity,” said Nupur Ghosh, vice-principal of the school.
Ghosh said coexistence had taken a hit even in the school after the pandemic — both students and parents have become “more intolerant”.
“The idea is not just to have a one-day fest but by delving deep into the book (We, the Children of India), we are trying to make our children understand the significance of the words like liberty, equality, secularism and the fact that we need to coexist. When our children take back these values, the message will also reach the parents,” said Ghosh.
The festival had a street play category, titled Samvidhan ki Pukar. In one play, students from a city school highlighted how equality is challenged when there is discrimination between a man and a woman in the society when it comes to pursuing career goals.
In an activity called Decoding the Preamble, the students were set different tasks in math and English or in pictorials to arrive at a word from the Preamble.
The day-long fest was preceded by a workshop about a week back, where students were taught the meaning of the words equality, justice and secular and were told to write what they understood of each of the words with references to experiences in their own life.
On Tuesday, the tone of the festival was set by the principal of the school in her introductory speech. She addressed the students as the future of the country and told them to take back the word “acceptance” with them.
“I thank all our teachers for making this effort to not only make a physical journey but to make a journey inwards today to celebrate our country, to celebrate diversity,” said Anjana Saha, principal of the school.
“Take back this word — acceptance. Accept each other, value each other, respect each other... That means learning not to hurt anybody physically and mentally,” she said.
At the end of all competitions and celebrations, Saha asked the students to reflect on the personal journey they made.
Some of the participating schools were Modern High School for Girls, Shri Shikshayatan School, Indus Valley World School, Birla High School and Sri Sri Academy.
