How many of you are willing to give up a part of your pocket money to cheer someone you don’t have any idea of? Or utilize your semester vacation in not just enjoying but making plans to make some underprivileged kids’ dream come true? Well, these people from Panacea are, and they aren’t only willing, but doing this for the past 2 years!
A group of about 40 people, after being done with their +2 board examinations, more than willingly put their efforts to contribute for the betterment of the society and implemented their own ways to stay connected and return the society back its very own share. Most importantly, they wanted to make this whole idea work, with no external help, but their own effort and hence, PANACEA was given birth – a team dedicated to social work. Here, the members save their pocket money every month to fund the arrangement of interactive programs where they go as a team, talk with people, promote education and its benefits in areas where these facilities are not available, distribute educational material, like books, copies, pens, pencil boxes etc, arrange for teaching sessions and so on, once a healthy amount of money is collected.
This January, the members of Panacea decided to collaborate with Jagadish Bose National Science and Talent Search to conduct a series of science quizzes and Music Appreciation Programmes for the kids attending the organisation for their science camps.
Like every year, this year too JBNSTS organised Science Camps for students from schools of different parts of West Bengal. They had 5 such events in the months of January and February. In each event, the members of Panacea conducted either Science Quiz or Music Appreciation Programmes for the students.
The first event at the ‘Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search (JBNSTS)’ was held on 12th January, 2017 where the members conducted a Science Quiz Competition with around 60 students from Birbhum Zilla School and Siuri Public School . This was the first time they worked with such a huge organization. In the first event, the two participating schools were Birbhum Zilla School and Suri Public School. The participants were given copies, stationary kits, pencil bags and dictionaries. Victors of the Quiz Competition were awarded with storybooks.
Their second event at the Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search was organised on 19th January 2017, where they once again organised a Science Quiz with students from Rani Binode Manjuri Govt. High School and Nalhati Hariprasad High School. They gifted the participants with copies , stationary kits, pencil bags and dictionaries. Victors of the Quiz Competition were gifted storybooks just like the previous event.
Their 3rd event at Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search was held on 9th February, 2017 where they organised a Science Quiz once again, this time with students from Kakdwip Birendra Vidyaniketan and Khansaheb Abed High School. The participants were gifted and awarded as usual. Smt. Aditi Ray, President, Inner Wheel Club Salt Lake too attended this event and encouraged the participants.
Not only in this event, the Inner Wheel Club, Salt Lake and Smt Ela Ray stood by the members throughout the series of events they conducted for JBNSTS by supporting and encouraging them and helping them improve.
Their fourth event at the Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search was held on 16th February 2017 where a ‘Music Appreciation Session’ was organised with students from Ekalavya Model Residential School, Jhargram, Midnapore and Janapriyanagar Janapriya Vidyalaya, Basanti. The session was conducted by some amazing musicians of this generation like Shri Surojato Roy, Smt. Debasmita Bhattacharya, Shri Jyotirmoy Chakrabarty and Mr. Gabriel from France. There, the students were given some ideas about Indian music, different taals, various ways to play with beats. The members provided the students with some percussion instruments like maracus, tambourine, shakers, etc and they played along with Surojato, Debasmita, Jyotirmoy and Gabriel, who again conducted and participated in some musical games.
The students were gifted with copies, pencil bags, stationary kits and dictionaries.
This was the first time they organized an event of this kind and it went on to be a huge success.
Their fifth and final event at the Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search, was held on 23rd February 2017 where Panacea organised another Music Appreciation Session with students from Jhargram Kumud Kumari Institution, Jhargram, Midnapore and Ghutiarisharif BM Vidyapith, Ghutiarisharif. The Music Session was conducted by Shri Surojato Roy, Shri Jyotirmoy Chakrabarty and one of the members of Panacea, Somak Sanyal. There too, after some discussion about the types of instruments and sharing their own ideas regarding music, gifts were disturbed and that marked an end to their series of events at JBNSTS.
People of 21 are generally considered self centered and social media addicts, aren’t they? But there are plenty of them who find solace in helping others rather than celebrating or partying with their friends.
The members of Panacea still do not have much monetary help but they are trying hard to make it work with whatever resources they have and their effort is praise worthy. The idea of Panacea is not only embedded within the boundaries of Kolkata, but other states as well. There are members residing in other states, plenty of whom had to shift due to educational purposes and at times, they sacrifice their holidays to execute these events. Many had to fight with their family members to support the cause because not everyone gets permissions to visit distant places, sometimes to places lacking proper transport. Not all of these young folks come from wealthy families, but that does not hamper their work. They mix seamlessly with everybody, they are so free of any inhibitions and that’s where the pride of Panacea lies.
At present not many know about them, but the word can surely be spread, right? The members are doing something that needs appreciation and boost. Why not just support them by just letting them know that we appreciate their hard work? For now, let’s just say, keep going Panacea, we are proud of you.
