Recently, with a sip of coffee, I went down my memory lane. It has been a week since my daughter’s annual day at school, however, something is still pestering me. The thought that how our tradition is shirked today, keep haunting me. Everyone is enticed by the wonderland stories and theatre of spectacular opulence. Our tradition has lost its place in today’s tumult of fashion. And, most of the schools today leave tradition to its fate, doing little to resurrect it.
My daughter’s school had invited all the parents cordially to their annual day. The annual day agenda was mostly occupied by the flamboyant dance shows, songs and dramas. However, what they forgot to imbibe in their soirée is some traditional dresses in India and animal costumes. Gone are the days when a drummer set his beat to the sound of kids running after them. Lost are those when monkeys dance at the rhythm of damru (small two-headed drum) and kids enjoy the moment buoyantly. Kids have no source of enjoying the priceless moment except school and society functions in this vogue of modernization. At one point I should be happy that my daughter has got the privilege to read in one of the most prestigious school. But, on the other hand, I am worried about her being ignorant about our culture and tradition. I came back crestfallen from the function.
| School Kids Prepared for the Annual Day Performance |
Next morning when I consulted my concern with the class teacher of my daughter, she stated the inaccessibility of quality traditional dresses in India and varieties of animal costumes. I pressed my lips to the reality that
may be the paucity of demand for such costumes for kids is to be blamed. May be there is not enough demand that can trigger supply for such costumes in our society.
Again, I got an invitation for annual day of a school, this time it was my friend’s son annual day. The annual day season is on but I am getting my feet numb. I knew the function would not be any different from what I already witnessed. But, I had to accompany my friend on her repeated entreaty. To my surprise the function was way different. Some sweet young boys performed “bhangra”, a coterie of beautiful young girls performed an amazing classical dance, and a “jungle book” play where cute little angels impersonated characters of jungle. The theatre adorned by traditional dresses in India with cartoons, superheroes, birds and animal costumes, looks like a well-orchestrated success. The parents sitting beside me where sharing their jollity while praising BookMyCostume. When I asked about BookMyCostume, my friend went on expressing her felicity with BookMyCostume. She said all these beautiful, opulent and varieties of costumes for this function has been ordered by BookMyCostume, which is India’s leading online kids costume portal providing fancy dresses and accessories on both sale and rental basis pan-India. They have even provided fancy dress ideas on their website.