St Xavier’s School to host National cultural festival - ‘Unity in Diversity’

GANGTOK, 08 Jan: The Centre for Cultural Resources and Training [CCRT] organizes interaction, meets, National/ Regional camps, festivals and workshops for its scholarship holders from time to time with an objective to facilitate their learning by interaction with renowned artists, eminent art exponents and erudite scholars all over the country.

In order to achieve this aim a national cultural festival titled ‘Unity in Diversity’ is being organized from 02 to 08 January for the first time at Pakyong, East Sikkim in collaboration with St. Xavier’s School, Sikkim, informs a press release issued by Dy Director, CCRT, Rishi Vashist. The festival is aimed at creating an awareness of the fundamental principles underlying the development of Indian Culture and its plurality with special emphasis on Regional manifestations, the release informs.
Besides this, it will provide an opportunity to the scholarship holders and the school students to meet eminent gurus, erudite scholars and other young artists from different parts of the country and exchanging views and ideas on the different art forms practiced in their regions.
About 103 young CCRT scholar-artists 01 each from Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab and Rajasthan, 02 each from Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Maharashtra, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Tripura, 03 each from Kerala and Nagaland, 05 from Karnataka, 07 each from Manipur, Odisha and West Bengal, 23 from Sikkim and 31 from Assam are participating in this festival from all over the country getting specialized training on different performing and visual arts, the release mentions.
The major art forms being represented during the festival are Vocal Music - Hindustani, Carnatic Rabindra Sitar, Mridangam, Khol, Classical Dances namely Bharatnatyam , Kathak, Odissi, Mohiniyattam, Manipuri and Sattriya of Assam. Traditional Folk Art Forms such as Folk Dances, Folk Music, Thang- ta, Dhol, Bhangra, Rabindra Nritya and Theatre will also be a part of the festival.
Besides these performing arts, visual arts in the form of painting are also being represented. The festival was formally inaugurated by the Principal of St. Xavier’s School, Father Jerad Lepcha on 02 Jan in the School Auditorium.
The release informs that the various activities to be conducted during the festivals are lecture- demonstrations by traditional artists, interactions with the eminent gurus and visits to places of historical and cultural importance in and around Pakyong to study the impact of rich heritage on the creativity of artists of this region.
In addition, the solo performances of the scholar – artists and school students is also being arranged for the local public daily in the evening in the auditorium of the school from 03:45 PM to 07:00 PM. The young participants will be guided by the gurus and renowned artists to develop synchronized group cultural productions in the field of vocal and instrumental music, dance - ballet, dance drama and setting up an exhibition of art objects made by them during the festival as well.
The release further mentions that a valedictory function of the festival will be organized on 08 Jan in the St. Xavier’s School Auditorium at in which all the synchronized group cultural productions such as Vocal Music Compositions guided by Rosey Brahma, a classical singer from Guwahati, the instrumental Music ensemble in the direction of Pradeep Kumar Ray, musician from Bhubaneshwar, Dance-Ballet choreographed by Dr. Meernanda Barthakur, classical dancer from Guwahati and Dance-Drama directed by Shelly Paul, an artist from Kolkata, developed during the festival will be presented by the participants.
An exhibition of art objects made by the participants will also be set up in the guidance of eminent painter from Delhi, Dhruva Awasthy and local artist from Gangtok, Deepa Rai on the occasion.
The Centre for Cultural Resources and Training (CCRT), an organization under the aegis of Ministry of Culture, Government of India is working for the propagation of culture among teachers and students throughout the country for more than 30 years now. The CCRT has its Headquarters in Delhi and its Regional centres in Hyderbad, Udaipur and Guwahati.
The CCRT is organizing a variety of training programmes for cultural administrators, teacher educators, in-service teachers of all levels and college and school students which are aimed at linking education with culture. More than 6000 functionaries working in the areas of education and culture and 50000 school children are trained every year by the CCRT.
Another major programme implemented by the CCRT at national level is Cultural Talent Search Scholarship Scheme which facilitates the learning of various traditional performing and visual arts by the outstanding children all over the country. Every year 500 new scholarships are awarded to the children in the age group of 10 to 14 years out of which 25% scholarships are reserved for the children of practicing traditional artist families and 20 seats are kept for the specially challenged children. The scholarship continues up to the age of 20 years and an amount of Rs 12,600 per year is released out of which Rs 9000 is the tuition fee for getting the specialized training from the Guru/Institution and Rs 3600 is the scholarship amount for the student.