Saturday sabhas: Rajasthan students to get sermons by saints, classes on sanskar

Government schools in Rajasthan will organise sermons by spiritual leaders once a month, the education department has decided.

In the 2018-19 academic year, such sermons will be part of the extra-curricular activities. There are around 86,000 government schools in the state.

As per the academic calendar released by the education department, each school will organise ‘Bal Sabha’ (children’s meet) every Saturday for 30 minutes. These sabhas would have a different pattern every week.

On the first Saturday of the month, the students would be told about “inspirational incidents” from the life of a “prominent personality”.

The second Saturday would witness readings of ‘motivational, educational stories” by the grandmothers of the children or people of the older age under a ‘Sanskar Sabha’.

Likewise, the third Saturday would see ‘saints’ giving spiritual sermons, while the fourth weekend would witness a quiz programme on literature and epics. On the fifth Saturday, if the month has one, plays would be staged or patriotic songs would be sung.

Commenting on the move, director, secondary education Nathmal Didel said this is not the first time such programmes have been included. It was there in the 2016-17 academic calendar as well, he said.

“This is irrespective of any religion; it could be a Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or Christian. The saints, who are locally known, respected, and in whom people have faith could share values of life with the students,” he said.

In another initiative, the state education department will be setting up ‘Bharat Darshan’ galleries in its schools.

Education minister Vasudev Devnani tweeted that the galleries will have biographical paintings of freedom fighters and prominent people, and detailed information on rivers. “The move is to apprise over 85 lakh students of the Indian culture and prominent personalities.”

In 2015, the department had kept copies of Bhagavad Gita at secondary and senior secondary school libraries in the state. In 2017, the department had ordered that the 15 volume collection of writings by BJP ideologue Deen Dayal Upadhyaya be kept in all public libraries.