Gita Jayanti - Competitions- where everyone's a winner

February 10, 2011

I have discussed the uniqueness of the Gita Jayanti celebrations in Singapore. For last few weeks, Singapore has been buzzing with the competitions conducted by the Gita Jayanti committee. First the Gita chanting competitions where xx children aged 4 to 15 and 4 adults chanted various portions of Bhagavad Geeta chapter 5. Then several children competed in the Gita championship which required them to chant all 47 shlokas of Gita chapter 6 and 30 shlokas of Gita chapter 7. Finally, we had the Geeta essay and oratory competitions.

Click for the names of the Gita competition winners.

It is very heartening to see the extent of interest in these competitions. Parents often make the mistake in assuming that Samskritam is difficult to learn, chanting is difficult to learn, the meaning of the Geeta is difficult to learn. Every one of these children and the adults proved it wrong. We think our children are not ready to absorb philosophical concepts. Wrong again. The best part here is that as Krishna himself says in chapter 2:

स्वल्पमप्यस्य धर्मस्य त्रायते महतो भयात् ||२-४०||

svalpamapyasya dharmasya traayate mahato bhayaat.h .. 2-40..
Even a little of this knowledge, even a little practice of the YOGA, protects one from the great fear.

The Geeta oratory speeches are now on Youtube - click links below to access. See for yourselves if they get it.

Category 3 Oratorical topic: "Be like a Lotus leaf in Water"
Category 1, 1st Prize, Adarsh
Category 1, 2nd Prize - Jayendra
Category 1, 3rd prize, Sharadha

Category 2 Oratorical topic (yes, it is a mouthful): "The spirit of equality and oneness alone is the boat to cross ups and downs in the ocean of life (Samsara)"
Category 2, 1st Prize Palaniappan
Category 2, 2nd Prize Prajwal

The Gita Jayanti organizers have brought out an excellent souvenir on the occasion called Gīta Vāni. The photos, the layout, everything is great. I commend the publications team for a terrific job, well done. (Disclosure - they've been kind enough to print one of my contributions!)

Hari Om and Namaskaar till the next post

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