Youth Jumbish

Youth festival - Youth jumbish is a space to celebrate the young changemakers, inspire young people to get engaged and see how the process will benefit both them and the world at large. It will also give them concrete spaces to get involved through volunteering and other means, and put the focus on how it can be cool to be an active citizen. The Festival we hope will also help the society at large see active citizenship as an integral part of education of a young person.

We hope that the spirit of fun, celebration and hope, along with real examples will help inspire young people to embark on a journey of self to society, and start the process of creating a community of Youth active citizens who can create their own vision of what Jaipur should be like and act on it.

What will the Jashn- e- Jaipur: A Youth Jumbish do?
There are many young people wishing to create social change and becoming active citizens in Jaipur. However, they often find themselves in isolation and feel the need for a platform where they could connect with like minded peers, and discover and enhance their potential as change makers.

It is precisely this platform that we want to start building through the Jaipur Youth Festival. With this festival, young people will be inspired to become active citizens by creating their vision of Jaipur, celebrating the work of young active citizens and identifying ways in which they can get involved.

It will also create a case for how getting involved in society gives a space to learn many things including skills which help in developing a good responsible human being which will help in both career and life.

All this of course while having fun, and using interactive and creative methodologies like theatre, music, art, and craft among others.

Some questions that we hope the Youth festival will raise:
- Can Citizenship be more than just a relationship of an individual and a state?
- What are our responsibilities to common spaces beyond our homes and institutions?
- How are our lives connected with those who we have never met?
- What can we do to make love, peace and respect universal values?
- Why is Active citizenship so important?
- How can we move from independence to interdependence?

Why active citizenship?

Empowering children for active citizenship
Rama Errabelli


I was standing in a queue at a pharmacy, when a man cut the line, and walked confidently up to the counter, stuck his hand out, expecting the pharmacist to fill his prescription. A foreigner, waiting patiently in line for his turn, called out: "excuse me, sir, there's a line here!" To this, my fellow citizen turned around and said: "what line? No line in India, only line in America!" And turned back to the counter.

Extremely embarrassed and offended at the man's response, I walked up to the counter and requested the pharmacist not to attend to him unless he joined the line. The pharmacist firmly requested him to join the line. But when the man pressed on, insisting that "there are no rules in India", the pharmacist gave up and filled his prescription.

Several situations like this have arisen before, but this time the incident really annoyed me. Initially I was concerned about the man's irresponsible response. But as days passed, and I recounted the incident to my family and friends, two things began to bother me. The first was the pharmacist's "let us get this over with and move on" attitude, and the second — no one else in the line objected to the man's disregard for the people waiting their turn.

I was, and continue to be, deeply concerned by this attitude. What makes us so numb that we do not even respond? Is it the "I cannot change him, why should I bother?" attitude or is it "what is the big deal?" Swalpa adjust madi or just "let someone else take care". I believe it is deep-rooted apathy.

How do we teach our children and ourselves that being silent spectators will not solve our problems? How do we confront this apathy and engage as "active citizens" of our society? How do we develop a deep sense of belonging to address the challenges that face us? How do we inculcate respect for our fellow citizens, respect for the society, the nation?

The answer is quite clear. We need to teach our children social and moral responsibility, the idea of citizenship, from an early age. Children have to be empowered with knowledge, skills and values that will guide them into being active citizens. To strengthen the values taught by parents, schools too must teach children — honesty, integrity, fair play, service and respect for fellow citizens. Schools can also play a crucial role in nurturing active citizens by focusing on building skills in children. Skills that will make them confident to effect change. Skills to think analytically, communicate effectively, solve problems and make decisions.

Finally, schools play a key role in empowering children with knowledge, and motivating them to actively engage in the concerns of the society. Children need to be taught their rights and responsibilities, and to understand how the various public institutions like the government functions. Schools can build awareness and sensitise children to important civic issues in their communities, and encourage them to explore solutions to those issues.

One cannot lecture to children on the idea of citizenship. Citizenship values, skills and knowledge can be cultivated only through practice. Classrooms are a perfect place for this learning to take place. Over the past five years, Janaagraha successfully introduced Bala Janaagraha, a practical citizenship education programme for children, to nearly 15,000 children in schools across Bangalore. Through interactive classes and project work children are empowered with the knowledge, skills and values necessary to shoulder the responsibility of citizenship.

If we "sow the seeds of citizenship" in our children today, then, it won't be long before there is a scenario where if a person breaks the queue, every one in the line will protest, the counter in-charge will insist that he will not be served unless he joins the line, and the man understanding what he has done, will graciously move to the end of the line.

(The writer is Coordinator, Bala Janaagraha, Janaagraha)

First ever "Comics & Theatre" Workshop May 2008

Idea Behind the Workshop

Pravah Jaipur Initiative has been in the process of building its presence in Jaipur. Our past experiences reflected that the work that we are doing, is not so common in Jaipur Accessing young people thus becomes difficult unless done through institutions. At the same time, Institutions may have their own limitations in terms of space, time and what should be the end product. In order to jumpstart the initiative it was also necessary to use the summer breaks of the various institutions.


Added to this we felt that many young people in the state are passionate about creative arts like theatre and drawing but have not been able to access them. These art forms and creative interactive methodologies like those of theatre and Comics play a huge role in helping young people to unleash their creativity, discover new engaging tools of communication and through that process get to know themselves better, gain confidence and acquire and enhance the ability to communicate their feelings, thoughts and passions clearly. Experiences such as Capacity building workshops on Theatre and Comics, would enable them to build their understanding of working together and of social issues. The skill of communication that they would learn would also help them inspire others to join and then stay engaged as they together strive for social justice.

With this context in mind, Pravah Jaipur Initiative along with Jan Kala Sahitya Manch Sanstha World Comics India, Muskaan and Jawahar Kala Kendra organised the Capacity building through Theatre and Comics Workshop in May provide young people with a space to discover the magic within and to the skills to share it.


Vision & Objective of the Workshop

• It was for young people to gain confidence and develop new skills through creative arts to engage with social issues
• By the end of the workshop the participants would demonstrate the learnt skills of comics and theatre and an increased level of confidence through the presentation of their creations
• By the end of the workshop a core group of at least 5 young people will emerge, who will volunteer to associate with the Pravah Jaipur Initiative
• As an outcome of the workshop at least one strategy around how the career orientation of young people and active citizenship agenda of Pravah can be brought together in a win- win way

About our partners for this workshop 


World Comics India (WCI) is collective of cartoonists, media persons and grassroots activists. WCI promotes comics as a communication tool and as mode of self-expression in remote and difficult areas South Asia and other countries.


Please visit  www.worlcomicsindia.com for more information.


Jan Kala Sahitya Manch Sanstha 'JKSMS is a non-Governmental and non-profit making social organization working for the Social development - rehabilitation - protection and empowerment of women, children and deprived class of society.The organization organization founded in the year 1983 by social activists who were devoted and committed to promoting change in society and social Justice.


Please visit www.jksms.org for more information.

Jawahar Kala Kendra JKK is an arts and culture centre in Jaipur. Known for its beautiful architecture and support that it gives to artists both established and emerging, it is one of the most popular venues for workshops and performances.

Muskaan is an organisation which works on road safety in Jaipur. Muskaan collaborates with schools, colleges and the traffic police to increase awareness and therefore improve road safety in the city. 

Please visit www.muskaanonroad.org for more information

Highlights from First Workshop from 5-8 May 2008

32 participants came for the 4 day Capacity Building through Theatre and Comics workshop from 5^th to 8^th May 2008.  Coming from all across Rajasthan and with an age range of 14 to 28 years the group was very diverse, also in terms of gender, rural- urban, strata and levels of confidence. Though officially slated to be between 10- and 5 pm, the workshop for the most part started by 9:30am and ended close to 7 pm, due to the enthusiasm of the participants.

The energy of the participants, the facilitators, and whoever else decided to drop by really carried the entire workshop through. For the first three days the participants got to know each other and learn the skills of Theatre of the Oppressed and Grassroot Comics. The last day was the field check day, when all the participants took their plays and comics to the Jawahar Nagar Kachhi Basti (Tila no. 5).

 

The plays were on Gender discrimination and Domestic Violence and the Comics on issues like caste discrimination, Road safety, Corporal punishment in Education eve teasing, exploitation of farmers, and inspiring young people to speak up in the panchayats or anywhere else for their rights. All of these were very well received by the people. Little children and elderly women all took on the role of the Oppressed women in the plays to show how the situation could be improved. For most of the people this was the first time that they had ever visited a basti, and was a huge and sudden reality check.

 

All the participants were very inspired and felt that they had seen a huge increase in their confidence level and realized that they were connected with social issues and needed to understand them better and work on them. They all wanted to form a youth group. The Jaipur based participants would be the more active core group for this youth group

The group was officially launched in the evening during a formal event organized and compared by the volunteers themselves. The function attended by at least 80 people received very good feedback, and was a great space for many a skeptical parent to see what their children were involved in.