Hundreds of volunteers, mostly young, started celebrating the Daan Utsav, a week-long national festival of giving, organised by the Bakul Foundation across the State on Sunday to mark the Gandhi Jayanti.
The Day of Service, a part of the Daan Utsav, was observed on the first day. Started in 2012, the Day has created a platform for people to volunteer and experience the joy of giving. Since then, thousands have joined.
On Sunday, hundreds volunteered to spread joy among children and elderly at orphanages, old age homes and slum clusters in 20 cities of India, including 12 in Odisha such as Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Puri, Brahmpur, Sambalpur, Rourkela, Angul, Dhenkanal, Jeypore and Baripada.
The volunteers took up various activities with children at shelter homes such as SOS, Divya Jyoti, Asha Kiran, Pratibha Ashram and Ashrey in Bhubaneswar and Basundhara, Nirman and St Antony’s in Cuttack.
The activities involved storytelling from a children’s book published with illustrations by children to develop the joy of books among children. The story was about a boy with a nose, which kept growing longer. After the storytelling, the children were excited at becoming little Pinocchios by making long noses for themselves with paper and strings.
At many places, children made art installations such as fish and dragons from the milk and sweet curd packets gifted by the Milk Mantra on the occasion. Members of the dance group, the Protean Hoofers, did dance workshops with two groups of children in Bhubaneswar. Volunteers did a theatre workshop at the SOS Village here too.
The event was coordinated by Pooja Mishra, lucy Parija and Alok Kumar Swain.