Umang Festival: Celebrating the differently-able too

KOHIMA, AUGUST 23: To create awareness about the issues faced by persons suffering from disabilities in any form, and to provide them with a platform to interact with other children in a healthy and congenial environment, a festival dubbed the ‘Umang festival’ was organized today at North Field in Kikha near Kohima town.
The event was undertaken by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India.
The festival is part of the Government of India’s national policy for persons with disabilities. It is being organized particularly for children with disabilities in the northeast region.
The wife of the governor of Nagaland, Kavita Acharya, was the chief guest of the North Field event. A similar programme would be conducted on Wednesday at G Rio School, also in Kohima.
Apart from differently-able children from Nagaland, several other children with disabilities from Assam and Meghalaya, along with their teachers, took part in the festival.Speaking during the occasion, Kavita Acharya lauded the North East Zone Culture Center (NEZCC) for organizing said festival. Umang Festival is a commendable initiative to provide opportunities to bring the differently-able closer to the society through cultural interactions, she said.
Acharya also expressed confidence that the festival would not only create awareness but also bring appreciation for the lives, stories, and artistic expressions of this marginalized community.
“Most importantly, this festival should remind us that we are all created in the likeness of God,” Acharya said.
Earlier, delivering the welcome address was the joint director of the NEZCC, Talinokcha. He said that Umang was a special scheme under the Ministry of Culture. The NEZCC, as a cultural centre, was implementing the scheme in the northeastern states, he said.
According to Talinokcha, the basic objective of Umang festival was to encourage the differently-able children to exhibit their talents and also to provide opportunities for them to interact with other children.
Seven more of such festivals are being celebrated in the northeastern states. They are in Ziro (Arunachal Pradesh), Jorhat (Assam), Imphal (Manipur), Tura (Meghalaya), Aizawl (Mizoram), and Gozing (Sikkim), and Agartala (Tripura).