Mumbai, 13th August: On the occasion of India’s 74th Independence Day, Desh Apnayen Sahayog Foundation, which has been providing opportunities and resources to over 900 schools to help create ACTIZENS (alert, informed and active citizens), organised the Grand Finale of ‘My Country, My Pride’, an inter-school contest.
The winners of the contest were students from DCM Presidency School, Ludhiana. The students that were a part of the winning team were Navgun Singh, Ziya Oberoi, Neelabh Karnwal and Kanishka Sharma!
The first runner ups were Taha Lokhandwala, Samruddhi Shelke, Ebrahim Sapatwala and Hatim Kapasi from Diamond Jubilee High School, Mumbai.
The second runner up was awarded to Soumili Mukherjee, Aritri Banerjee, Ritoja Bhattacharya and Soma Chatterjee from East West Model School, Burdwan, West Bengal.
Commenting on this, Vallabh Bhanshali, Founder and Chief Mentor of Desh Apnayen (and the Enam Group), said, “When my associates and I started Desh Apnayen over five years ago, we aimed to proactively help create Democracy 2.0 – one in which citizens exert a sense of ownership continuously, with the goal of making India a great country, in every way, for every citizen. We are very happy to see young students coming forward with so many ideas and aspirations for their country and well-researched analysis between India and other countries. The Chief Guest, Padma Shri Mohandas Pai, who addressed thousands of students and teachers at the online event, was also very appreciative of the event design and the finalists’ ideas and presentation.”
The chief guest of the event was Padma Shree awardee, Mr. Mohandas Pai. Sharing his experience, he commented, “These students are compassionate and eager to learn. The contest was an enriching experience not only for them but also for me. It was very refreshing to hear their ideas about how they will go around bringing a change in the country. I was impressed by their dreams for India. The ACTIZEN initiative by Desh Apnayen is definitely an outstanding and a necessary initiative to inculcate values of love and patriotism towards the country in these bright children.”
The event was livestreamed on Desh Apnayen’s YouTube channel and an email contest was also announced.
Schools that would like to take part in Desh Apnayen’s regular programmes can write to info@deshapnayen.org or 8898890202.
About Desh Apnayen –
Desh Apnayen aims to build an accountable citizenry and society around three themes: Citizenship Education, Volunteerism and Neighbourhood Engagement.
Its school program, the Desh Apnayen ACTIZEN Club, gives students a chance to hone leadership skills, work on community service initiatives and participate in new activities every week. Teachers also get access to engaging ACTIZEN Education content at no cost to them.
