Panaji: The Goa government has asked all schools in the western Indian state to observe Yoga Day on their premises on June 21 a Sunday.
The Directorate of Education (DoE) has also asked the schools to send a report of their Yoga Day celebrations to the directorate of youth and sports affairs along with photographs as a confirmation.
The DoE directive was issued on Wednesday a day after it withdrew a circular endorsing the Yoga Day event by a private organization at in a stadium.
The department, however, wants schools from primary to higher secondary level, including special and private institutions, to observe Yoga Day at their premises.
The schools have been told to observe the day with the practice of simple yoga asanas, as shown in the ministry of Ayush website, from which the surya namaskar sequence has been dropped. They have to access the booklet and video of demonstration of Yoga Day exercises on www.indianmedicine.nic.in, as reference.
Students and teachers in Goa will have to report to their schools to observe the first UN-declared World Yoga Day.
Some quarters were opposed to the celebration of Yoga Day by school students as they were apprehensive that students may be asked to practice the surya namaskar or salutations to the sun sequence. Sun worship is against the beliefs of some religions.
But Ayush’s video and booklet demonstrate simple warm-up exercises and the practice of some yoga asanas, only for beginners’ level and serve the purpose of loosening joints. The practices will end with shavasana, or the corpse pose, where the aim is stress relief.
A survey in 2001 revealed that Goa has 2,153 schools. They included primary schools, middle schools, secondary schools and higher secondary schools.
A sizeable number of them are under Goa Catholic archdiocese.
Most schools in Goa are affiliated to the state board. The state education department prescribes the syllabus for these schools. However, national boards also run a few schools in the state.