It\’s Iftar time!

“Why do we celebrate Ramzan in our school?”

The question from Correspondent kindles the curiosity among the gathered children. A sudden huge wave of silence engulfs the place and children sails hardly to come up with the right answer.

“To celebrate Ramzan sir”, a kid comes up with his answer by raising his hands.

“Yes I agree… but why should we celebrate Ramzan in our school?”  correspondent is very peculiar in his question.

Again a minute of silence… “To share our happiness”, a boy says in a soft tone, by remembering the skit enacted by his friends a few minutes before.

“Good, that is one of the purposes of Ramzan. Again my question is what the purpose of celebrating Ramzan in our school is?”

The question triggers the children to think. “Sir”, a voice calls correspondent. He turns curiously to the girl standing behind him to know her answer.

“To respect the other religious practices and beliefs” Correspondent applauded with a huge smile on his face, which conveys the message that the answer was right.

“This is an opportunity for us to understand the customs and traditions of other religions. It promotes the message of sharing and respect for all religions, as a part of our learning about different religious practices”

But what triggered the idea of celebrating Ramzan?

Student parliament- a bunch of young fresh minds wanted to have Iftar party, like how they celebrate Pongal in their school. The weekly meeting was held on Wednesday, and the crew decided to celebrate Ramzan in their way. Food Carnival, Dance, Drama, speech were the pop-ups during the discussion.

The secretary of the Parliament was taking notes and concluded the minutes. As a next step, they took 10 minutes to decide the in-charges for the event. The team was very excited to have Iftar party which they named as Food Carnival.  Now comes the rules for the events. The team had a dilemma to include 1-3 grades in the game, but they decided to go ahead with them. Since kids were involving they avoided using knives in the rule book. Finally, food carnival was furnished with rules and named it as inter-class competition. On the same evening permission letter, rules were drafted by the team and submitted on the Principal’s desk.

The principal took the idea to the teachers\’ committee, and one of the teacher’s idea was class-teachers to bring the knife. Three teachers volunteered for the event. One teacher took the in-charge for Dance and drama, whereas the other two took in-charge for speech and agenda preparation.

The school decided to have Ramzan Celebration on Monday after the weekend. Students literally got few hours’ time to prepare for their performance. The day was on, it started with a welcome speech by President of Students Parliament. Next was the skit.

The skit was presented by the students of grade 7, 8 and 9. It was the story of a two school going girls, where one of the two girls is unaffordable to pay school fees. The other girl was in the enjoyment of getting the new dress with the money her mother gave her. But on seeing her friend unable to pay fees, she helps her friend with her money which was offered by her mother for Ramzan dress. This story of love and sharing impressed the children and they all appreciated the effort made by students in presenting it.

Then was the speech, dance and final few words given by the Correspondent. It was followed by a formal vote of thanks and the cultural event concluded.

As per their plan, they organized a colorful food fest for two periods with great enthusiasm and vigor. Food displays with a variety of delicious dishes tempted and attracted everyone.

A 1st-grade child who was so eager to keep her food on display brought readymade Bun-Butter-Jam from the bakery. Whereas 8th-grade students who made herbal juice and suggested us to drink that by saying medicinal uses. No judges, No plastic were used, purely a competition without marks, without prizes happened with a lot of thrill.

With over 216 dishes from children of 1st to 9th grade, this platform builds a base to promote their culinary skills killing the biases both boys and girls worked together and achieved the real intention of organizing this event.

With added knowledge about the Ramzan, students returned classes excited to taste the dishes prepared by their friends. And in this way, a meaningful program reached its conclusion.

BTW, “But why do we celebrate Ramzan in our school?”

\”To respect the other religious practices and beliefs.\” 

What a way to feel secularism outside the classroom. That was the moment we felt great to work with this school.

– Karunya D, Vidhya Vidhai