A white man throws Gandhi’s shoe out of the train in South Africa. Gandhi throws the white man’s hat out of the train. When the man asks Gandhi why he did that, he replies: “Your hat has gone to get my shoe.”

This incident from the life of Mahatma Gandhi was part of the International Youth Day celebrations by All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) Salt Lake constituent branch. The day is actually on August 12, but was being held three days later to coincide with Independence Day.

The skit on Gandhi was directed by Minati Ghosh. “I had performed a similar play in school,” she recalled. 
The actors were students of AIWC’s remedial classes. These are free tutorial classes for students already attending school. AIWC also runs an adult education project, which imparts basic education to those who did not get to go to school. Shilpa Hazra, a 13-year-old studying there, sang Dhanodhanyopushpe bhora and other students enacted a play on freedom-fighter Kshudiram Bose’s life. 

There were also group discussions on topics such as “We are proud of our heritage” and “Fight against foreign domination”.

Students had also come from the AB Block-based cultural institute Ta-thoi. Adit Bhattacharya and Swagata Das presented a guitar performance in duet to the song Sare jahan se achchha and Madhumanti Dutta performed Odissi dance. 

“The event was a great attempt to inculcate a spirit of nationalism while making the students aware of their country’s fight for freedom,” said chief guest Urmi Chatterjee, a psychologist.