Utsav

Utsav is CMCA's annual festival where in all the schools get to present as to what do they understand of various civic and environmental issues in the form of skits, songs, games etc. It is in this event that action heroes from various schools are felicitated.

Below are the schools that won prizes in 3 major categories Best stall,Best skit and Best Song
BEST STALL:

1st: Hussain Allana English School
2nd: Hiranandani Foundation School, Powai
3rd: Pali Chimbai Municipal School (Aseema)

BEST SKIT:

1st: Little Flower of Jesus High School
2nd : Beacon High School
3rd: Hiranandani Foundation School, Powai

BEST SONG:

1st: Gopal Sharma Group of Schools (SSC)
2nd: Gopal Sharma Group of Schools (ICSE)



Here are few pictures and articles about UTSAV this year.



On the 31st of January, CMCA’s annual fest ‘Utsav’ was held at St. Aloysius School in Bandra. The fest was filled with talented children, fascinating projects and innovative ways of spreading awareness. The sun shone brightly as we boarded the bus and there started our journey, towards the useful fun and environment friendly fest.

After a long drive we reached school and I was enthralled by the projects the various schools had made.

The projects were very innovative and totally eco friendly. I was stunned by the project that the under Chimbai Municipal school had made. They had transformed a simple cloth into an attractive hand bag. They even showed people how the cloth bag can be used to wrap gifts. I couldn’t think of a better way to save our environment. Many other schools had made colourful charts and meaningful attractive models. This was just the beginning. Then came the singing competition. The crowd cheered and clapped as the performers sang confidently and melodiously. I was enjoying the songs as they were tunes from our favourite Bollywood songs. The songs came to an end as the skits started.

I saw one of the schools perform their skit which was in the form of a street play. They proved their talent by doing a marvelous job. I felt if they actually went to the film industry they would do an amazing job. Our school performed next and did very well. The meaningful skits came to an end and along with it, so did the fun filled ‘UTSAV’.

By the time we went home the sun was at its best. We really enjoyed Utsav and would love to go to the fest again. It was a wonderful and mesmerizing experience which we will always remember and cherish

Aishwarya Sadasivan

VIII C

Hiranandani Foundation School,

Powai.

CMCA Utsav

It was bright and sunny when I reached St.Alyosius at Bandra for CMCA’s annual festival- Utsav. I was told that the school children had arrived at 8:30am to set up their stalls. The program was scheduled to start at 10am, but started a little late because the chief guest Mrs. Seema Redkar had not arrived. Mrs. Redkar is the officer on special duty in the Solid Waste Management department for the BMC. Our second chief guest was the famous cricket commentator Mr. Harsha Bogle. They both spoke to us about how to save the environment and of the impending disaster of Global Warming. They also told us not to be cynical about the government and leave everything to it. After that the awards for the action heroes were given. The action heroes were children who were active citizens as they stopped others from doing things like using plastic bags and urinating on the road. It was an amazing idea to confer these children with awards for helping the city.

The activities for the day were announced and the song competition started. The songs were amazing and a lot of effort was put. Following this there was a break for 10-15 minutes when I played the snakes and ladders game and visited the stalls. I really liked the Hiranandani Foundation, the Jamnabhai Narsee, the Hussain Allana and the Beacon High stalls. There were many stalls put up by other NGOs like ASEEMA and GOONJ .I really loved the GOONJ stall and I bought a skipping rope made from old clothes from them. Some stalls had really advanced technology used in the construction of the exhibits. Another stall that I really liked was put up by the Andheri volunteers. Apart from other tips to reduce global warming it explained how much energy was used by appliances when “off”, but on standby and when they were on.

I also learnt to make a cute spider, using an old mineral water bottle and coloured paper. It was a very different activity and I’m sure that all the children enjoyed it heartily and have put up their spiders in their rooms, mine is on the dressing table mirror. In the middle of the morning, the canteen ran out of snacks, but the day was saved as they had a huge pot of delicious biryani ready. The skit competition had some really well made skits dealing with topics like pollution, corruption and active citizenship. The game “Bin the Waste” and “Antakshari” had to be scrapped due to lack of time, but nonetheless the Utsav was a success.
I really, really enjoyed this Utsav and I hope CMCA keeps improvising and expanding every year.

Kaagni Harekal
CMCA Junior Volunteer