Report on Kumudvati Yatra

For the current academic year (2012-13)the theme of our school is “River as Life”. Intending to work on this, Purnapramati organized a field trip to Kambala village on the foothills of Shivaaganga, the birth place of Kumudvati which is one of the main tributaries of river Kaveri on Friday, the 11^th August, 2012. The attendees included the guests Dr Rajendra Singh, the water man of India, Sri Lingaraju, Dr Radhakrishna Bhadti, Mr Srinivasa(NASA), faculty from IIMB and IISc, teachers, team members, children of Purnapramati and parents of a few children.

We boarded the bus at 6.40 am near primary campus and reached Vishvaradhya Gramantara Prouda Shale, the government school of Kambala. Cool and pleasant atmosphere of Kambala, stage well set for the planned programmes, presented the air of welcome. The events began with the Gangapooja by the guests and the principals of Pramati and Kambala government school. Sri Srinidhi welcomed the gathering.  Pramatians then enacted the skit “Hosa Chiguru Hale Beru” which conveyed the deteriorated state of knowledge and harmony with nature and society in the present times. It also exhibited Dr.Rajendra Singh’s struggle and success in rejuvenating seven dried up rivers of Rajasthan. Dr Singh then addressed the gathering enlightening about the issues of water bodies in India and the remedial measures that need to be necessarily taken by the people. He expressed his pleasure in taking part in the programme and assured the audience that there would always be his support and guidance for any of such water rejuvenation activity. This was followed by Sri Lingaraju’s speech on Shivaganga hills, the Kumudvati river, its origin, issues and remedies. The session ended with the famous song ILidu baa taayi for which the Kambala school teachers also joined with their voices. The whole gathering was catered with delicious breakfast before we left for our next programme, desilting the Kalyani which is close to the school. The inspired villagers signed up in masses with pick axes and trays.

At about 1.00 pm we proceeded towards one of the springs of Kumudvati where Sri Lingaraju educated Pramatians about the formation of a river through a number of such tiny springs. Dr Singh and other elders then lead the children to plant saplings at a nearby place in the hill.

In the next leg of our program,we moved about 20 km from Shivaganga hills to Sri Gopal Navele’s farm house where we had our lunch.  Some of the local people and farmers had assembled for a small programme  organized to create an awareness about the condition of Kumudvati river. Sri Rajendra Singh and Dr Lingaraju  addressed the gathering. Inspired by them, the youth who had assembled there vowed to work seriously on the rejuvenation of Kumudvati and conservation of nature. Our children also enacted a small play on Godavari river written and directed by students of 4^th grade. The programme ended with group photo session of the gathering with Sri Rajendra Singh and other guests. By about 5:30 pm we left the place and reached Bangalore at 7:30 pm.