The annual Goa Yuva Mahotsav has been a platform where young leaders are forged and Chetan
Acharya, the Konkani Basha Mandal (KBM) President, is one such by-product. Goa
Yuva Mahotsav, the biggest youth festival in the state, sees a participation of
more than 5,000 youth and KBM has a big role to play in its organisation and
success.
“It was Anant Agni who got me into Goa Yuva Mahotsav,” says
Chetan who had participated in the second Goa Yuva Mahotsav and since then been
closely associated with the cause of Konkani. He later became part of the
organising team of Yuva Mahotsav and was pulled into the main committee of
Konkani Bhasha Mandal by stalwarts who understood his commitment and
dedication.
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Chetan, who was the working president of KBM’s Goa Yuva Mahotsav
in 2003, is the president of Konkani Bhasha Mandal in his third consecutive
term since; he held the position of secretary before that.
KBM, having a membership of over 2,200 members, conducts an array
of activities catering to all sections of society, irrespective of caste, creed
or religion.
Elaborating on his long association with the organisation,
Chetan says, “Work done by KBM attracts people automatically. KBM has a legacy
of selfless activists who have gone as far as to obtain loans for the cause in
lieu of personal gold ornaments. This Konkani movement is an example of
communal harmony. This rational movement does not observe religious rituals
(like dindi, palkhi, besao) in any of their functions. Critics fail to
appreciate this. This was the main attraction to me.”
“We have alAways associated ourselves with different
organisations working in the field of Konkani,” he says, while speaking about
their outreach.
For starters, during his tenure, KBM has built good relations
with organisations across India, working for children’s literature. It has been
working closely with national level organisations such as NCERT, Pratham Books
(Bangalore), Eklavya Books (Bhopal), Ektara Foundation (Bhopal), Jyotsana
Prakashan (Pune) etc and through this, they have managed to translate major
children’s works and several good literary works in other languages to Konkani.
KBM also organises the Shenai Goembab Kathamal, which is the
biggest storytelling competition in the state, seeing a participation of above
5,500 primary and high school students every year. Chetan adds that it was
imperative to conduct this competition on a single day all over Goa and credits
the participants of Goa Yuva Mahotsav for making it happen.
Apart from this, KBM organises the Radha Mukund Naik Elocution
Competition for higher secondary students, Arun Singbal Quiz for higher
secondary and college students, Chitrangi Meet for women and youth, gives
awards to writers and Konkani workers apart from the Petul extravaganza, where
over 200 kids from across Goa perform in front of a crowd of more than 1,000.
Petul, a bouquet of different projects that are weaved the
entire year, includes production of music CDs, books, charts, primers etc; it has
been a major activity during Chetan’s tenure. Speaking about this event, Chetan
says it gives him great pride as it helps cultivate the creativity of a child.
Three books and three music CDs of Konkani rhymes, designed for
pre-primary children, have also been produced during his tenure. This was a
huge project, where more than 150 nursery rhymes were set to tune and sung by
over 120 students from different schools in Goa.
Another event that is in tune with KBM’s aim to strengthen and
build children’s literature in Goa is the Bal Sahitya Parishad that aims at
finding ways to enrich education through the use of children’s literature in
day-to-day learning.
A quarterly magazine titled ‘Chirput’ was also launched for
primary children. “Several original titles have been produced, which have been
illustrated by some of the top artists in Goa and outside. Special workshops
are conducted at regular intervals for both writers and illustrators so that a
quality product is arrived at,” adds Chetan.
Chetan also states that Shikshan Parishad (Education Conference)
and Sangeet Sammelan (Music Festival) are new activities that are being given
top priority for the future. Books related to education, research and a
thesaurus as well as a mobile app for an English to Konkani dictionary are also
in the works.
In addition to creating a tech savvy team that has used social
media and technology to its advantage, one of Chetan’s biggest achievements has
been KBM’s secondary school that was started during Chetan’s tenure, a major
step in the path to give quality education from pre-primary to secondary
education to children in Margao.
While
that batch has increased from 52 to 123, the Mandal has also conceptualised and
created syllabus for pre-primary schools and major publications during his
tenure.
