Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti
As the world is hungering for peace, Gandhi Smriti is a living testimony of the human response to conflicts using the weapon of non-violence. The national memorial of Mahatma Gandhi in New Delhi, India is the sacred premises where the Mahatma fell to the assassin’s bullet on January 30, 1948. The hallowed house treasures everlasting memories of the last 144 days of the Mahatma’s life. The serene yet a precinct which is full of action is an inspiration for all those who have unstinted belief in the Gandhian values of love, compassion, peace and non-violence.
The thrust of the programmes of Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti, which is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Culture, Government of India, is to instill amongst the various cross-section of the society the values, which Mahatma Gandhi stood for. The multifarious activities of the Samiti are aimed to draw people especially the youth towards constructive work for the community. With a vision of the 21st century, the Samiti has evolved programmes aimed at different sections of the society including children, youth and women. The endeavor is also to prepare today’s youngsters towards the goal of total development as envisioned by the Mahatma using innovative processes.
Gandhi attached great importance to education for the evolution of a non-violent society. He used to say that education must be of a new type for the sake of the creation of a new world. A major focus of the Samiti’s programme is children. They are the future leaders and in the backdrop of increasing materialism there is urgent need to acclimatize them with the message of the Mahatma so that they become socially responsible. Over the past several years, the Samiti has being able to initiate a series of programmes for children across the country.
One of the initiatives as part of ‘Taking Gandhi to Schools’ is the Gandhi Media Literacy programme. The aim is to develop critical understanding of the media amongst children through a Gandhian approach and promote active citizenship amongst the children. The programme is being implemented both in urban and rural areas of India. Recently the programme has been initiated in a few schools of Mexico City. As part of this initiative, the Samiti brings out a quarterly children’s newspaper, The Yamuna. The newspaper has child reporters in several cities of India, Nepal and Mexico City.