Bhubaneswar:Daan Utsav- is India’s ‘festival of giving’, launched in 2009 is celebrated every year – commencing on Gandhi Jayanti, 2nd – 8th October. This is the 10th year of DaanUtsav or known as the Joy of giving week, where people are engaged of Art of Giving money, time, resources or skills to others.Sachin Tendulkar dedicated himself for the cause of promotion of this festival of giving as its Ambassador.
In this festival many people like auto rickshaw drivers to CEOs, school children to celebrities, homemakers to opinion leaders and media personnel – millions of people from all walks of life join together to give their time, money, resources, or skills back to society during this week. They either by creating or participating in events of their choice enjoys the ‘Joy of Giving’. A giving event could be as simple as a family taking out their maid’s children for an ice cream party, or as large as a ‘Gift Compassion’. In 2017, many people participated in more than 10,000 events across 1000 cities in.India by raising crores of money and materials as donations and also by giving countless volunteer hours.
This year,Odisha is also celebrating and will be also one of the states which will spread the festival to rural areas. Now people of Puri, Badamba, Daspalla, Badabarsing, Bari etc will also be part of the festival, celebrating and impacting a lot in social and economic changes.Odia rapper , Samir RishuMohanty , aka Big Deal along with ManasSahu, the Sand artist from Puri will be contributing and will be a part of DaanUtsav 2018. Even a 20-20 bicycle tour from Bhubaneswar and Cuttack to tour to promote 10thDaanUtsav.
On this 10th year, Alia Bhatt, LataMangeshkar, AzimPremji, Mary Kom, Anu Aga, ChhaviRajawat,DeviShetty, Justice Srikrishna joined with Sachin Tendulkar as Ambasadors to promote the festival to a greater heights. Hence, this may be the right time for any Media House to carry forward this movement of Giving and connect the readers & viewers to be the change.
Cities like Mumbai and Bangalore were involved in this festival through various works like engagement of NGO stalls in Mumbai Metro, AAHAR, Art Pathasala , 200 Goonj Buses for Collection, Mumbai Beach Cleanup etc. Letter to 50k integrated child Development Centers (ICDS) across Tamil Nadu issued for children to plant saplings.