EDUCATION

Promoting reading habit among kids
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 28
Reading might be passe with computers reigning supreme but books continue to occupy centrestage in DAV Public School, Sector 8. It is a tradition that the school authorities are striving to keep alive by adopting innovative and interesting reading techniques in the school, ensuring the children are not weaned away from the very soul of education.

Apart from routine classroom reading sessions, the school organises an activity called ``Reading together for the year 200X’’ every year.

This is that time of the year when the entire school, staff, students and employees get together to read. Those without formal education, too, are given picture books to go through. Right from the Principal to the Class IV employee, they pursue just one goal. To read and uphold the universality of the reading habit.

“If it is the year 2001, the entire school will read for as many seconds. Each year we increase reading time by a second to correspond to the year and the students look forward to that day with great enthusiasm, bringing their favourite books to school that day,’’ says the Principal of the school, Ms Sarita Manuja.

Replete with activities that augment reading, the school, besides organising visits to book fairs and providing exposure to the latest as well as the classics in the world of books, organises its own book exhibition from time to time.

In order to encourage parents to inculcate the spirit of reading in their wards, book exhibitions in the school provide them with a myriad range to select.

The school’s “Readers Club’’ and the “Scholastic Book Club’’ in the advanced stage, also encourage reading. Taking care of the academics of reading as well, students also compete in inter-school book review presentations.

Ms Manuja says it has made a world of difference and the interest in reading has picked. “We started this as an experiment almost three years ago and today we can see the results for ourselves. As Principal of the school, I have the satisfaction of contributing my mite towards making reading a habit with my students and one that will stand them in good stead in times to come.’’

‘Need to see history in new perspective’
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 28
History has been the only subject to have been surrounded by controversies about facts, more prominently since past more than three decades. The so called leftist thinkers are the main driving force behind many challenged versions today and media has not lagged behind in supporting their logic.

This was stated by Prof Devendra Swarup, an eminent historian and columnist, in his lecture on “Blinkered concept of Indian History” at DAV College here today. The lecture was organised by the Panchnad Research Institute.

Professor Swarup said, “distorting history has been the choice of these leftist historians. They looked at history through available sources in English. Their only point of view in their secularism was ‘not to hurt the Hindu sentiments’. He said a letter of the Bengal Government in the past had gone to the extent of deleting certain portions of texts that were against other communities than Hindus, of temple destruction incidents and many other facts. The premier agencies like ICHR and NCERT also became tools in the hands of these writers.

He said historians in this “special” category were not even willing to go in for rethinking, which was against the very principles of the subject. Each foreign ruling power in the country earlier had set notions and vested interests, which percolated through their writings. A fresh attempt was the need of the hour.

Certain historians went on to quote incidents of history creating stories of “Hindu vandalism”, he said. Their ropes extended to the media and premier publishing agencies by following a policy of “Publish yourself and prohibit others from being published”. In a way a wave of “intellectual terrorism” had ruled the history books and the efforts being made by the current government to revive facts were being dubbed as “Hindu interest only”.

In his talk yesterday, Professor Swarup said each foreign invader had presented history to suit his own national interests. In fact, the whole Indian history needed to be seen in a completely new perspective.

He said foreign invaders made efforts to twist parts from ancient texts to suit their own arguments to plant an inferiority complex in Indians. Things have come to such a pass that “we believe only what others tell us about ourselves”.

Mr Shyam Khosla, chairman of the institute, presided over the concluding session. Dr K.S. Arya, vice-chairman, was also present.

Library opened at hostel
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, April 28
Residents of Maharana Pratap Hostel, Sector 25, here would have an added advantage of having a library in the hostel complex itself. A library equipped with a wide range of books including those on Rajputana history, freedom struggle, current events was inaugurated at the hostel today.

While inaugurating the library, Mr Pawan Kumar Bansal, MP, said more such libraries should come up to inculcate reading habits among the youth.

Ms Lalit Joshi, Mayor, was also present on the occasion. According to Dr Pardaman Singh, president-in-chief of the Rajput Students’ Aid Society, Rs 1.5 lakh were given by the MP for the library.

At present as many as 20 students are staying in the hostel. Once the construction of the hostel building is completed, it would provide accommodation to 350 students studying in various institutions of the city and surrounding townships.

COURTS

CONSUMER COURTS
IGNOU fined Rs 50,000 for inefficiency
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, April 28
A consumer court has directed Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) and the School of Computer Information Science, an academic unit within IGNOU, to pay Rs 50,000 to a student for deficiency in its services. The court further directed IGNOU and the school to pay Rs 1,100 as the costs of the case to the student.

The complainant, Mr Paramjit Singh Rehncy, a city resident, had filed a case against IGNOU and the School of Computer Information Science alleging deficiency in its services and using unfair trade practices by the institution.

The complainant, an architect, had enrolled with IGNOU for advance diploma in information technology (ADIT) in 1999. As per the complaint, the payment for the one-year course was Rs 30,000 and as per the prospectus sent by IGNOU, six teaching methods were indicated in a tabulated form, giving tri-semester-wise percentage breakdown utilisation of each method. However, the complainant stated that only Internet learning course was made available.

The complainant further alleged that the e-mail address of IGNOU had only 2MB space for 200 pages to cater for 100 to 150 students, whereas thousands of students had been enrolled. Hence the e-mail sent at that address normally bounced back. Even the examination of first tri-semester was initially postponed to be held along with that of second tri-semester on March, 2000 but both of these were later held in June 2001.

The complainant further alleged that confusion was created by the institution by sending the date-sheet indicating the examination to be held on June 12, 2000, which was later postponed. To compensate for the deficiency in the teaching methods, the complainant averred that he had to join extra courses in software technology for which he had to pay an additional sum of Rs 30,000, while for another software course a sum Rs of 36,000 was spent. The complainant had prayed for a compensation of Rs 11,36,000.

CULTURE

Picking up nuances of theatre
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 28
They are a spirited lot of 40, ready to take on the world. As part of the 25-day-long theatre workshop organised by the North Zone Cultural Centre at Kala Gram, students of Ajit Karam Singh International School, Sector 40, are sure to add substance to the task at hand. They grasp instantly; improvise perfectly and enact almost superbly.

No wonder the Kala Gram kept resonating with sounds of laughter all through the duration of the workshop today. Dealing with the vibrant kids, aged between seven and 14 years, is Umesh Kant, an ace theatre director from the city, who has productions of the order of “Sakharam Binder”, “Gadhe ki Baraat and “Media” to his credit. In his first stint as a director of children’s theatre workshop, Umesh Kant did not look apprehensive about the results and reasons for this are not far to seek. “These kids are full of vigour. Their reflexes are so sharp that they assimilate my directions instantly. I must say that my professional actors may take time to understand my requirement, but these children deliver without any delay.”

Like a white canvas sheet which glows with colours splashed on it, the 40 children were busy working on situations given to them. They were also seen concentrating on breathing exercises this evening. Till now they have learnt all about the basics of theatre, right from mime, stage setting, themes, speech delivery to observation, costume designing, lights and chorus concepts. Not just that they are also gaining hands on experience at script writing and improvising.

With entire detailing having been done, Umesh Kant will begin concentrating on script development from tomorrow onwards. The idea is to use creative talent of kids to develop a script which can be enacted towards the conclusion of the workshop. In fact, results of the workshop will be seen on May 19, when the children will present a play rehearsed during the workshop.

Though the content of the play to be staged is not yet clear, Umesh Kant is clear about the nature of presentation. “I would like to present a comedy. I think the children will be able to improvise situations given to them. We may actually evolve a play from children’s feedback during the workshop. If there is any problem, we will select a comedy and stage it.”

Till now the kids have improvised a court scene wherein a murder trial is in progress. They have written their own dialogues and have created their own sets for the situation given to them by the director. The next scene to be improvised is — you break into some house with an idea to steal you get caught; now you have to escape, how will you?

As for musical scores, Umesh Kant will again bank on children’s talent. Said the director, who is being assisted by Yogesh, “Many among them are good singers and dancers. We will develop our own scores. I hope the final production will be as fresh as these kids are.”

The workshop, being held daily between 5 and 7 pm, will conclude on May 19.

Musical bonanza
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, April 28
Melody reigned supreme at “Sur Soz”, the 24th musical bonanza in non-filmi songs and ghazals, organised by the Sur Saptak Club at Tagore Theatre this evening.

The programme though started late as the chief guest, Mr Birdevinder Singh, MLA, turning up late and thus forcing the audience to wait for an hour for the programme to start. As it started about 15 compositions by S. Rakesh and sung by different singers warmed up the atmosphere.

The programme that started with a ghazal ‘Hum to nacheez hain jag walo’ by Veenu Kautish moved onto touching numbers like ‘Tum bin mere geet adhure’ by Rinku Kalia and ‘Kaam karo, kaam karo.’ S. Rakesh, who has written lyrics for Pankaj Udhas famous number ‘Thodi thodi piya karo’ and ‘Ye peene wale bahut hi ajeeb hote hain’, also sung a duet song ‘Ta umr raho ge saath’ with Kanchan Kulkarni.

The accompanists who infused life in the lyrics included Veval Sharma on flute, Gautam Dhar on tabla, Neeta on dholak, Munish Sachdeva on guitar, Mohnish Arora on octopad and Subhash on congo.

Star hunt reaches last stage
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 28
Pepsi has announced the names of three more semi-finalists of the musical talent hunt launched in Punjab some time back. Titled "Pepsi banjaa sitara yaara contest", the hunt is meant to "scratch out" talent from the land of Punjab.

As of now, Agya Singh(26), Sanjay Khan(30) and Avtar Birdi(40) emerged winners in the third quarter final. In a live concert held at the Roshan Grounds, Hoshiarpur, on April 26, six quarter- finalists performed in front of over 10,000 people. The contestants were judged by Gursewak Mann, Harbhajan Mann, Harry Anand, Paramveer Singh, music director Atul Sharma and Ashok Kaura of ETC (Punjabi Channel).

Meanwhile, Kanak, Sewa and Sukhdev join Akriti Kakar, Tarlochan Singh and Manpreet Dhillon, Kanak Joshi, Sewa Singh and Sukhdev Sagar, who had emerged winners in the first and second quarter finals held at Bhatinda and Moga. The last semi- final was organised in Amritsar today.

The semi-finals and the finals will involve live performances by the selected contestants. The finals, which will witness a musical extravaganza, will decide the ultimate winner. All rounds of the contest will be telecast on ETC Channel.