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Agewell’s Symposium on ‘Older Persons: Custodians of Heritage, Culture and Tradition’
Added: (Fri Jun 26 2009)
Agewell’s Symposium on ‘Older Persons: Custodians of Heritage, Culture and Tradition’
New Delhi 25th June’ 09: Agewell Foundation, an NGO dedicated towards the welfare of Older Persons across the country, today conducted its 18th symposium under the series of "Needs & Rights of Older Persons" titled ‘Older Persons: Custodians of Heritage, Culture and Tradition’ at IHC. Agewell Foundation is about understanding needs of older persons, providing advocacy for their rights and sensitizing every one about Old Age.
Leading the Symposium were eminent personalities like Dr Karan Singh, President, ICCR as the guest of honour and Pt. Briju Maharaj, well-known exponent of Kathak & Capt. M S Kohli, Himalayan Environment Trust as key speakers. The series of Symposiums urges everybody to support and take forward Agewell’s initiative of educating the Older persons about their rights & needs and reminding the younger generation, the concerned persons, government officials, bodies, institutions and others of their duties towards their elders.
Speaking as an expert at the symposium, Dr. Karan Singh said, “Despite of our great respect towards our cultural heritage, tradition and arts, our cultural heritage is on the verge of collapse. Our younger generation is much impressed by western lifestyle and gradually forgetting its traditional value systems. We need to resurrect our traditional value system and encourage our great cultural heritage at all levels. Initiatives like change and reform in our educational system, increased role of concerned organizations in this regard, etc. can certainly make a difference. Older persons are undoubtedly custodians of our heritage, culture and tradition. We need to bridge the gap between generations in order to conserve, preserve and develop our cultural heritage, traditions and arts.”
Present at the symposium Pt. Birju Maharaj, another distinguished guest also expressed his concerns about diminishing value system and Indian cultural heritage and traditions. He said ,” It has become major challenge before all of us as how to protect great Indian cultural heritage, traditions, arts & crafts.”
During the interactive session all the distinguished guests and participants from all walks of life appreciated the initiatives taken by Agewell Foundation in this direction. Talking on the occasion, Mr. Himanshu Rath, Chairman, Agewell Foundation said, “Our cultural heritage and traditions, which have been developed over the centuries and transferred one generation to another are today struggling to survive due to changed socio-economic scenario and fast changing value system. Older persons are our cultural ambassadors in true sense. If more is not done to raise visibility and relevance of older persons they run the risk of disappearing from national consciousness. Agewell is therefore emphasizing the need of utilizing life time accumulated traditional cultural knowledge
skill and experience of Older Persons for social issues of to-day and thus enabling Older Persons to become visible and relevant to family/society.”
Established in 1999, Agewell Foundation’s Project Aadhar was commissioned as Secretariat of National Council for Older Person by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Govt. of India. Aadhar was set up with a mandate to look after the grievances of older persons across the country, representing them in finding solutions to their problems. It has a Helpline service to listen, counsel and organize assistance for older persons, Eklavya – a National Employment Exchange Programme, School Contact programmes, Agewell Family Membership and Self Help Groups amongst other services. The other proposed initiatives of Agewell are Old age Management – Training Programmes, Care Givers – Training Modules, Old Age and Disability – an Outreach Initiative, Old Persons in Prison & Asylums – An Assessment, Pension possibilities and Cross Cultural research to develop intervention methodologies.
For further information about the activities of Agewell Foundation, please visit our website: www.agewellfoundation.org