State Level Camps of the Mahamandal

The 16th Annual Bihar-Jharkhand State Level Youth Training Camp of the Mahamandal was held from 15 to 17 November 2010 at Gautam Buddha Industrial Training Institute, Hazaribag (Jharkhand).

The Annual Chhattisgarh State-level Youth Training Camp was held from 29 to 31 October at Bilaspur with 130 campers.

The Annual Camp of the Sarada Nari Sangathan

Sarada Nari Sangathan, the sister organization of the Mahamandal, is working silently among women for their life-building since 1989 with the ideal of Sri Sarada Devi. Now there are 50 units, which organize weekly study circles and some social service activities. Many of the units arrange daylong women’s training camps to propagate the ideas of the Sangathan.
The 21st Annual All India Women’s Training Camp of the Sangathan was held from 28 to 31 October 2010 at Bhogpur K.M. High School, Bhogpur, Dist. Purba Medinipur, West Bengal. The aim of the camp was to inspire women in life-building, following the ideal of Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Sarada Devi, and Swami Vivekananda, and to organize them for this work. From all walks of life 408 women joined the camp as trainees, and 127 more participated in the programmes on Sunday. Revered Pravrajika Shuchiprana Mataji of Sarada Math, Dakshineshwar, inaugurated the camp on 28 October and addressed the campers and guests.
The main training programme included classes and question-answer sessions on character-building, mental concentration, and the aims and objectives of the Sangathan as well as physical training and music classes. An exhibition was set up on the life of Sri Sarada Devi. A bookstall with the Mahamandal and Udbodhan publications was opened. On the last day of the camp a colourful procession was taken out in the locality.

The great plunder

Our national resources are being systematically plundered for years and decades. With government connivance, of course. Legal and illegal private mining of coal, bauxite, iron ore, etc. has unsettled the tribal habitats and lay the areas waste. Forests have dwindled in the hands of the mafia, while the poor tribal has been for ages refrained from damaging the forest by bringing too many firewood! Poor collectors of Kendu leaves have been exploited for ages.

The privileged classes of India - the few honest people and those thieves - are responsible. By omission or by commission.

Foodgrains rot while hungry children die!

The multidemensional poverty studies of the UNDP has revealed that more poor people live in the eight poorest States of India than in 26 poorest countries of Africa. A huge number of children are dying every year here in our country for want of food.

Lacs of tons of food grain, lying over open grounds, are rotting, thousands of tons have been burnt. In spite of the directives from the apex court, the union minister for agriculture has ruled out the possibility of distributing the grains among the poorest of the poor.

Bhopal tragedy

The Bhopal disaster happened in 1984, when many of today's young men were either not yet born or just toddlers. Now they have an opportunity to have an idea of how a section of powerful Indians let the offenders go scot-free by paying a meagre sum of money. Some of the best known Indian lawyers, ministers, and government functionaries worked on behalf of the offenders. Some 15,000 to 20,000 people died, but who on the corridors of power really cares? Some ordinary citizens have been patiently working there for years and decades. So they were harassed by our own police. Yet they are still trying to do their bit. The environment was devastated, water got contaminated with toxic chemicals to such an extent that even today people are getting affected with deadly disorders and diseases. Many children are born disabled. Are we men? India today has too few men worth the name. Swamiji knew this problem well. So, he emphatically repeated, 'Make men first.' Come up, young men who feel. Let us work hard to this end.

Visit the Mahamandal website

Visit the Mahamandal website for news updates and the upcoming events including training camps.

Right to Education

Every child does have a right to education. That is his or her birth right, inalienable right, whether you pass a Bill to make an Act or not. Of course, the Act makes it mandatory for the governments to ensure that children get education. A welcome move indeed, a bit too late though - coming after 63 years of Independence. But we have such an Act to protect child workers, and we know how much it really worked. We remember once more: 'No Nation is great or good, because Parliament enacts this or that, but because its men are great and good.' 'So, make men first.'