EDUCATION

Celebrating the birth of girl child
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 1
To encourage the involvement of people in increasing awareness for rights of the girl child and against female foeticide today Yuvsatta, Dev Samaj College of Education, Department of Social Welfare, Chandigarh Administration, ICCW, Indian Red Cross Society and Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti organised a public function to celebrate the birth of all girls in Chandigarh. Mr Pawan Kumar Bansal, Union Minister of State for Finance, was the chief guest on the occasion.

The event was a grand party to celebrate the birth of as many as 150 girls, with their parents, brothers, sisters and people from different segments of the society enjoying the memorable moments.

Students of Dev Samaj College of Education, Sector 36 and Dev Samaj College for Women entertained the guests with cultural songs, ghazals, skits and bhajans.

Speaking on the occasion Mr Bansal said at least in Chandigarh parents and elders can be motivated to play a positive role to take forward the concept of equality and equal opportunities for sons and daughters.

Speaking on the occasion Dr (Ms) Satinder Dhillon, Convener of the programme said as part of their ‘‘campaign for peace-city Chandigarh’’, this is a small beginning to realise the goal of making Chandigarh a Girl-Child Friendly City. And in future such programmes will be organised at regular intervals to further strengthen and spread the message. Senior citizens from Old Age Home, Sector 15, also joined the celebrations on the occasion and blessed the tiny-tots. Special charkha weaving sessions were organised to share the message of Mahatma Gandhi with youngsters.

The coordinator of the programme, Mr Parmod Sharma, said ‘‘around half-a-million unborn girl-foetuses were aborted every year in our country. And now the time had come when along with the goddesses in temples, we should also pay due respect and regard to daughters, daughter-in-laws and mothers in our homes’’.

Vaidya on tech education panel
Tribune News Service

Pak delegation

Chandigarh, October 1
A delegation from Lawrence College, Ghora Gali, Pakistan, today visited fast food joint Hot Millions. The delegation, led by Principal of the college, two staff members and 15 students, would participate in the 159th Founders Day of Lawrence School, Sanawar. — TNS

CULTURE

“Perfect Wedding” — all about comedy and errors
Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 1
The success of theatre is judged, among other things, by the frenzy of audience applause. And if that be the sole standard, Vandana Sajnani’s “Perfect Wedding”, presented at Tagore Theatre by Chitkara and HSBC, this evening, was a hit.

Driving the play home was its utterly nonsensical, casual and comic script. As the script went round without reaching anywhere, the audience enjoyed a hearty laugh, inspired more by the reigning confusion than anything else.

Like all principal characters in the play, including bridegroom (Vivaan Bhatena), best man (Nasir Khan), bride (Karishma Tanna) and hotel’s chamber maid (Kavita Sharma), confused about who was dating whom, the audience was confused too. The problem was that there were too many questions and not a single answer. The big questions that went round during the two-hour-long play were who loved whom here and who wanted to marry whom.

Between the questions and their answers was the story of “Perfect Wedding” which hardly turns out to be perfect. From the dawn of the supposed wedding day, things only seemed to go wrong for the man, who cooked up one funny story after the other in an attempt to save his reputation and marriage. It was not until two hours passed that he realised he did not want to marry his chosen bride; that he actually loved the unknown woman he had the one-night stand with.

Nevertheless, he persuaded the best man to pursue this unknown woman (who later turned out to be the best man’s real girlfriend). But the best man, instead of helping the cause, messed up things by introducing the housekeeping maid as his girlfriend to the bride-to-be. The frenzy kept building up and the confusion worsened as actors shifted blame on each other to save themselves and the wedding.

By the time things got sorted out, the prefect wedding had been marred by too many imperfections. Now arrived the moment for truth telling. But once the truth was told and the story began to take shape, no one was interested in what really happened. The comedy or errors had done its job. It had made people laugh and had left the choice of the bride and the bridegroom to them. One really did not need any brains for this one.

Rajesh Mohan enthrals audience with ghazals
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, October 1
‘Log iss tarah bhi sooraj ko daga dete hain, Shaam hote hi chiragon ko jla dete hain’, and many more ghazals found true expression in the mellifluous renditions of Prof Rajesh Mohan at a literary conclave of the Sahit Chintan held at the Pracheen Kala Kendra complex, here, today.

Heading the Department of Music at a government college, the prolific vocalist Rajesh Mohan brought alive the thematic essence of lyrics of Dr Jagtar and Vivek Dev. He was accompanied by Harjit Singh on Tabla and Vijay Dev on harmonium.

Earlier, in a face to face interaction with Punjabi novelist Baljit Kaur Balli, the literary critics and scholars, held on her fifth novel ‘Pairan hethli dharti’ in the session presided over by Dr Prem Singh.

Mr Atey Singh, Prof Kulwant Singh, Dr Sharnajit Kaur, Ms Surinder Kaur, S.S. Cheema and others expressed their views on the different aspects of felicity of language especially the use of phrases of ‘malvai dialect’. The theme of pastoral life and representation of cultural ethos of three generations and a farmer’s dedication and love for the land despite the hardships galore, came up for discussion and virtual appreciation.

The novelist had based her perception on the close realities of life of a small farmer, with his aspirations, limitations, family and social obligations, opined Prem Singh.

Earlier, members mourned the sad demise of Canada-based novelist Kesar Singh Kesar.