Welcome to Anandavana – the garden of happiness

 Click here to have a glimpse of Anandavana

A tree is nature’s model for completeness. What grows from a small seed, with little nurturing becomes a sapling, then a plant and then a mighty tree. Flowers, fruits, vegetables, large branches that provide shade, home to birds, instruments for keeping the air fresh, and later wood to the humankind – contribution at every stage. Stands on its own, complete by itself.
Can humans be like that? Can we live a life of completeness, life of development guided by far-reaching goals than ones compelled by mere survival? We at Purnapramati believe that such is indeed possible if the development of an individual caters to his or her physical, mental, social and spiritual needs. Such a holistic development can make a person stand on his own but without losing the sight on his role in the society, see things in his own perspective and simultaneously relate to others’ perspectives. Ignore any of those dimensions or needs, and the outcome would be found wanting. Therefore, we have envisioned Purnapramati as a center of integrated learning.

We see children’s minds as seeds, with the potential to become like those complete trees. Cultural and spiritual values on one hand and a strong modern education on another are like water and manure to these seeds. One gives them strong roots and the other protects them from harmful influences. One without the other brings forth a sick, under-developed tree.

We deliver modern education, without any compromises on it, but in the background of Indian culture, in a way it makes sense in the current social context. Our curriculum interweaves the regular subjects such as Mathematics, science, social studies, with classical subjects such as Sanskrit, Samskriti (culture) and Philosophy.

Here, the children can speak both English and Sanskrit, can do mental-math like a child of any other school, also recite poems from the folklore, can tell anecdotes from Ramayana and Mahabharata, not just recite Gita but can even rephrase parts of it. Naturally, dance, arts and yoga are taught to children. There is stress on competitiveness, but without its dirty hood. Our utmost stress on quality in teaching and individual attention ensures a policy of not having more than 15 students in a class.

We have not just added three subjects but the entire method of teaching is related to the Indian roots. These are the impressions of our first year children, in their words:

“We are students of Purnapramati. Our school is unique in many ways. Bhaagirathi Jayanti is our environment day. We understand the importance of environment in the background of purity of Ganga. We learn about our festivals and also about our social duties on that day. National holidays are used for social activities. We sometimes mingle with other school children. We visit some sites, along with our gurus, to learn from live situations. We have an external faculty called ‘Purnapramati Vrundaaru-vrunda’, who teach us occasionally. And we have a fun-filled Purnapramati Utsava, our annual week! In that week, some big people spend time with us. Inspiring! Towards the end of the year, there is another program called Purnapramati Sameeksha. A discussion with accomplished teachers, educationalists from outside. They understand what we have learnt. They share their suggestions with our gurus. Our progress is also shared with our parents. The biggest thing is that we are not afraid of our school or our exams. We are not afraid of any punishment; after all we call our teachers as akka (elder sister) and anna (elder brother) who take care of us. We are not afraid of marks. Our school is fun  O God, we are blessed”.

We need your support in developing such children, who form the Anandavana. There are hundreds of children; young tender seeds with us now. We need a fertile land for these seeds to sprout. And as they grow, they need a large space to spread out. And to cultivate that space, we need more water and more ploughs! That space cannot come from one person or one small team. It should come from everyone in the society.

Come, let us build that Anandavana, where such trees will be grown!

Growing at a pace in line with demand, the school requires spacious unpolluted area for growth. That space is filled with greenery, a gurukula like environment with buildings to teach us games and subjects, auditoriums, residential hostels, a spacious playground and a meditation center.

This space will also be utilized for two more initiatives, aligned to the purpose of providing completeness in education: Higher Education & Research and Information & Publication House. The research institute is already up and functioning. It is initiated with a vision to critically explore the classical and contemporary systems for evolving integrative research and application in multi-disciplines such as philosophy, science & technology, arts, public policy. It will also cater to the educational needs of general public through outreach programs with courses like: Mathematics and Science in Ancient India, Contemporary applications in Bhagavad Gita.

Similarly, the House for Integrated Information and Publication is another area of our service. The house will be a one stop library for printed and electronic resources. We have already published more than 5 Sanskrit manuscripts, and a couple of Kannada works on Indian culture.

Purnapramati is a not-for-profit initiative. It can be supported only through an altruistic donation. Consider this as an offering to our culture and our children in a grand yajna (vedic sacrifice). In the words of Bhagavad Gita, this is both dravya-yajna (sacrifices with material offering) and Jnana-yajna (a mental sacrifice where the knowledge earned is submitted to the Supreme Being). Let us develop our children like the mighty benevolent trees. Let us dedicate this Anandavana to our motherland.

The following are schemes:
–    Krishnaarpanam:         No fixed amount
–    Bija-arpanam:             Rs 10000
–    Ankura-arpanam        Rs 25000
–    Sasya-arpanam:         Rs 50000
–    Vruksha-arpanam:        Rs 1 Lakh
–    Mahaavrukshaarpanam:     Rs 2.5 Lakhs
–    Kalpavruksha-arpanam:     Rs 5 Lakhs
–    Udyaana-arpanam:         Rs 10 Lakhs
–    Upavana-samarpanam:     Cost of 1 Acre land or more