Anjali Children’s Film Festival to be started from Nov 9

Children in ‘Anjali’ with full of life

BHUBANESWAR: “The soul is healed by being with children,” as the saying goes, it is proved again and again its significance when a person comes in contact with children. If it is a carnival like ‘Anjali International Children’s Festival’, certainly a person would feel the importance of the proverb after getting into the festival ground where all children are the envoys of peace and happiness.

The innocent tiny tots and smiling school goers with inquisitive adolescents were all enjoying the carnival of love participating in various workshops and games in the five-day long festival. The young minds bearing a tattoo of ‘Happy’, the festival’s mascot, were enjoying the camel ride, horse ride and sudoku with great joy. Besides, a huge range of workshops, competitions, cultural programs, musical performances and exhibitions, meeting the children of different States along with nighbouring countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka was a great experience for anyone.

Here every child is special and equal. Children with disabilities were performing with the general children in one stage and playing with each other. According to the organisers of the festival, the celebration of festivals like Eid, Halloween, Diwali and Ratha Jatra at camp Anjali goes beyond the frontiers of religious ambit and regional boundaries. The joyous celebrations bear witness to the humanitarian love- spontaneous and unconditional, the spirit of togetherness and as such an attempt for a society that accepts and accommodates each of us in a dignified manner as we are and with the little differences we have, they added.

Anjali Toyland, Cultural programme Indradhanush and Art Exhibition- Swayam cheered up the children with great enthusiasm and spirit. They were not burdened with loads of homework or school projects, but enjoying every moment with their new friends from different parts of the country at the camp. They were learning several arts from their resource persons like how to make clay pots, paper making, balloon sculpture, mask making, first aid contemporary dance, music and other interesting things in a jolly mood.

According to a volunteer Anant Prasad, the children are spreading the message of love and depicting that they are happy. Here the life of children is colourful. “I’m very happy that I got a chance to take part in the festival for the first time this year. When I see the children are dancing with joy with their friends after listening music or watching cartoons or ghost masks during entertaining them, I get happy and enjoy their innocent smiles,” said another volunteer Jyoshlin Panigrahy, a media student of a city based journalism Institute.

Some students from other countries participated in the festival. According to Sri Lanka children’s instructor Supun Shanaka Madushan, president of a Colombo-based organisation Rehabilitation Units for the Persons of Special Needs, said that they enjoyed the festival a lot. . This type of festival is very helpful for their children as they don’t have any children’s festival in his country, he added.

“We need to spread the inclusive ideas how to cooperate the persons with disabilities with the normal society,” Madushan said.

City-based organisation Swabhiman, who is the organiser of the five-day long International Children’s Festival, would also hold Anjali Children’s Film Festival, the only national children festival in India, after two days of the first festival. The film festival would start from November 9 and continue for six days at Rabindra Mandap in the city. Internationally acclaimed films like ‘Baaja’, ‘Foto’, ‘Sixer’, ‘Wrong Mauritius’ and ‘Xang Xang Klang’ would be screened in the festival, informed Swabhiman’s Chairperson Dr Sruti Mohapatra.