Happy International Yoga Day

The theme for International Yoga Day 2020 is Yoga for Health - Yoga at Home. According to the United Nations, while social distancing measures to fight the COVID-19 pandemic have shut down yoga studios, practitioners have turned to home practice and online resources. The theme highlights that yoga is a powerful tool to deal with stress of uncertainty and isolation and helps maintaining physical well-being.
celebrate International Yoga Day 2020 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry of Ayush, Government of India, has started a campaign called 'Yoga at Home, Yoga with Family' to encourage people to practice it and stay healthy.
Yoga Day 2020: Benefits of Yoga

Yoga is known to keep the balance between body and mind and help get rid of age-old diseases. From chronic diseases to deadly diseases like cancer, Yoga is the solution to every problem.

Here are a few benefits of Yoga-

Boosts immunity

Relieves depression, anxiety and stress

Strengthens bones, relieve joint pain and spinal pain

Weight Loss

Boosts cardio and circulatory health

Improves athletic performance

Increases muscle strength and helps in weight gain/loss

Helps fight infections and respiratory diseases

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NUTRITION AT SCHOOL

Nutrition is the intake of food, considered in relation to the body's dietary needs and a

balanced diet, together with physical activity, is a cornerstone of good health. The

international organisations are increasingly focusing their efforts on nutrition as they

underscore the importance of it, not only on at the individual level but as an asset for the

sustainable development of a country . As Ban Ki Moon stated: “Nutrition  is both a maker and a marker of development. Improved nutrition is the platform for progress in health,education, employment, empowerment of women and the reduction of poverty and inequality, and can lay the foundation for peaceful, secure and stable societies”. 

Nutrition is therefore a very complex and multifaceted issue as it encompasses a broad range of topics and, taken form a Sustainable Development Goals perspective, can be taken as the focal point from which one can address every one of those. Unfortunately a big share of the world population faces issues related to malnutrition, this being defined by the WHO as the condition related to deficiencies, excesses, or imbalances in a person’s intake of energy and/or nutrients. Whilst many western countries are facing a growing burden of Obesity and overweight individuals, the other side of the coin is represented by those developing countries affected by undernutrition and micronutrient-related malnutrition, with 90 per cent of the developing world’s chronically undernourished (stunted) children living in Asia and Africa. 

Under nutrition is defined as the outcome of insufficient food intake and repeated infectious diseases. It includes being underweight for one’s age, too short for one’s age (stunted), dangerously thin for one’s height (wasted) and deficient in vitamins and minerals (micronutrient malnutrition). According to Unicef, more than one third of the world’s children who are wasted live in India, with the rural communities having the highest rates of undernutrition and micronutrient deficiencies. Other nutrition issues faced by many underprivileged communities is Iron-deficiency-Anaemia (IDA), for which India earned by far the world sad record, and Protein Energy Malnutrition (PEM). The Indian government recognizes the importance of an adequate nutrition in order to end the vicious circle of poverty and its paramountcy for development, as noted in the national nutrition policy. The same document underlines the importance of nutrition education and the fact that schools are an ideal setting for that. Reason why the Mid-may meal scheme is been designed. Unfortunately, as noted in the previous article the shortcomings about the implementation of the programme are manifest and if we take them from a “nutritional” angle we notice that the programme failed to provide nutritious food as per programme guidelines.Therefore the question is: 

What can be done to remedy to these

shortcomings? The ministry of Human Resource Development highlights the importance of community participation for the successful implementation of the scheme, in order to

ensure an effective monitoring at the local level and underlining the importance of the

participation of NGOs which work at a grassroots level, having a hands-on approach to

such issues and dealing directly with the problems faced by the communities, thus creating a dialogue between those and the government. 

Therefore NGOs such as Heeals can be paramount for the remedying of the government shortcomings regarding the implementation of programmes such as the MDM scheme; tackling issues such as Infrastructure implementation, nutrition education and nutritional balanced meal provision. It is paramount to empower voiceless and unprivileged communities in order to buttress their rights as the issues that their facing are not an accident or a natural outcome of their actions, but they are socio-economical phenomena engendered by asymmetrical power relations and lack of access to the most basic resources and agency. 

As demonstrated by Amartya Sen, hunger and food insecurity are not related to food availability but to the lack of access to it on the part of certain individuals, and if we are to support the right to an adequate standard of living, including adequate food, we have to support and empower those people whom are more in need, making their voices audible as well as endorsing a pragmatic solidarity” approach. As Paul Farmer stated, the idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that is wrong in the world.

-        By -Andrea Angeli

WASH Intern Coordinator

Source

1 Global Panel on Agriculture and Food systems fo Nutrition; http://glopan.org/sites/default/files/

SDGPolicyBrief.pdf

2http://ucx3x320eshgjxppibt1rqg0.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/SUNMovement-

Strategy-and-Roadmap-Ban-Ki-moon-message.pdf

3 UNSCN; http://glopan.org/sites/default/files/Downloads/SDGPolicyBriefSummary.pdf

4 WHO; https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/malnutrition

5 UNICEF; https://unicef.in/Story/1124/Nutrition

6 UNICEF; https://www.unicef.org/progressforchildren/2006n4/undernutritiondefinition.html

7 UNICEF; https://unicef.in/Story/1124/Nutrition

8 WHO; http://www.who-seajph.org/article.asp?

issn=2224-3151;year=2018;volume=7;issue=1;spage=18;epage=23;aulast=Rai ; https://

www.hospitalmanagement.net/comment/anemia-prevalence-nears-40-india/; https://

timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/51-of-indian-women-aged-15-49-anaemic-most-in-world-study/

articleshow/61538152.cms

9https://wcd.nic.in/sites/default/files/nnp_0.pdf

10 see “Food and Hygiene” article.

11Government of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development; https://

elementaryeducation.tripura.gov.in/mid-day-meal; see “Food Hygiene” article.

12 Government of India, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Department of School

Education and Literacy; http://mdm.nic.in/mdm_website/Files/Guidelines/

3.MDM1%2021.09.2010.pdf

13 Amartya Sen, “Poverty and famines”, 1981, Oxford India Paperbacks

14ICESCR

15 For the concept of “pragmatic

SAFE FOOD FOR HEALTHY COMMUNITIES

The importance of food hygiene for community development The quality of our life is very much determined by the quality of the food that we eat. Food is paramount for human health and well-being as it’s mentioned in the Universal declaration of human rights in the article 25, together with clothing, housing and health care. Notwithstanding the objectives and rhetorical statements periodically put forth by  governments and international organizations, the current trends related to hunger and malnutrition are dire, with an estimated 821 million undernourished people in 2017 (compared to 784 million in 2015) one third of which live in South Asia. Children are  especially vulnerable to malnutrition as this hampers their full development and their ability to learn and lead a healthy and fulfilling life. 

Currently an estimated 149 million children are stunted worldwide with India having one of the world’s highest children under nutrition rates.  According to the UN 4 out of 10 children in India are not meeting their full human potential because of chronic under nutrition or stunting, leading to diminished learning capacities, poor school performance and increased risks of chronic diseases. As it’s shown by  researches promoted by the WHO, unsafe food creates a vicious circle of disease and malnutrition particularly among the most vulnerable individuals such as children. 

For these reasons the Indian Government decided to launch the National Programme of Nutritional Support to Primary Education in 1995, also known as Mid-Day Meal Scheme its stated goals being: enhancing enrollment, retention and attendance and simultaneously improving nutritional levels among children. Unfortunately some surveys and researches showed the gap between the stated goals of the programme and its actual implementation, the shortcomings being: lack of proper infrastructure for the processing, handling and provision of food; the poor nutritional value of the food provided; the lack of implementation in certain areas at all; lack of funds for the implementation of the programme and, as a result, the failure to meet the predetermined goals. Food hygiene is therefore a paramount issue to be addressed in order to prevent food borne diseases and malnutrition, and this has to be tackled both on the educational side (providing knowledge about the measures to take in order to have safe food) and the physical side (providing access to the necessary tools and infrastructure necessary to have safe food). The WHO defines food hygiene as the conditions and measures necessary to ensure the safety of food from production to consumption and identified five key areas related to the implementation of 

The measures necessary to guarantee food hygiene. These issues needs to be addressed  mainly in the rural areas where there’s a lack of awareness and infrastructure about the measures to take in order to prevent food borne diseases and where communities are most vulnerable to problems such as lack of access to services. FAO recognizes that schools are an ideal setting to support nutrition and development as children are at an age where food and health habits are being formed, and they can also influence families and be a channel for wider community participation, therefore creating benefits that extend beyond the classroom to households and communities. Given the shortcomings proved by the governmental program about school meals, the role of NGOs such as HEEALS are fundamental in order to tackle the aforementioned issues, providing educational and physical tools, and promoting development and health through a direct dialogue with the communities themselves. Only through a direct dialogue the empowerment of such communities can be obtained, by listening to the voices of the people on a grassroots level and giving them the freedom to choose. As shown by Amartya Sen freedom is both a mean and an end to development and is necessary to avoid the vicious circle of poverty.

-        - Andrea

Source 

www.un.org › universal-declaration-human-rights 1 https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/hunger/ 2 ibid. 3 https://in.one.un.org/un-priority-areas-in-india/nutrition-and-food-security/ 4 https://www.who.int/health-topics/food-safety/ 5https://mhrd.gov.in/mid-day-meal 6https://scroll.in/latest/935227/;https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2019/09/07/UP-govt-was-aware-7ofsevere-shortcomings-of-mid-day-meal-scheme.html;https://indianexpress.com/article/india/ over-900-children-reported-ill-in-last-three-years-after-consuming-mid-day-meals-hrd-ministry- 5828876/;https://indianexpress.com/article/india/priyanka-gandhi-uttar-pradesh-governmentschool-mid-day-meal-6161112/;https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/health/mid-day-mealhas-failed-to-attract-children-to-government-schools-says-cag-audit-52267

https://www.who.int/foodsafety/areas_work/food-hygiene/5keys/en/ 8http://www.fao.org/school-food/overview/en/ 9A. Sen, “Development as freedom”, 1999 10

The First Yogi !

Many features of Harppan religion are reflected in later Indian religion.

The beginnings of Yoga were developed by the Indus-Sarasvati civilization in Northern India over 5,000 years ago. The word yoga was first mentioned in the oldest sacred texts, the Rig Veda.Yoga appears to be even older than Indian Valley Civilization. Indus valley civilization dwellers inscribed visuals of their stories on seals .Many of these seals indicate that women  had an important role in nurturing plants as wells as trying to tame wild animals instead of hunting them.

The most well known of the Mohenjo – daro seal is the Pashupati Seal ,in which a three faced being wearing horned headgear is seated in a yogic trance ,surrounded by four wild animals such as an elephants, a tiger ma rhinoceros and buffalo and beneath his stool are two dear. Certainly this god shared many of the traits of the later Shiva which is also know as Rudra . Shiva is said to have five faces but only three faces are visible in the pashupati seal .Practice of yoga is much earlier than the harappna civilization

Yoga formally codified by Patanjali ,much latter in his Yoga Sutra during Ist BC. For Patanjali yoga was not just about the variety of physical exercise or  asanas ,it was a holistic system with both psychological and physical aspects .It included meditation ,pranayama and even introspective excersices such as learing to accept onself and others . According to Patanjali yoga was the ability to restrain random thoughts .Those who could achieve a high level of concentration in meditation continued to be regarded very highly ,as is evident from literature of the subsequent centuries .

In Bharavi ,”Kiratarjuniya 6^th Century AD. Depicts Arjuna as a hero ,not because of his abilities in battle but because of his power to still all contemplation and meditate .

In Yoga, Lord Shiva is considered the Adi Yogi and the Adi Guru. He is the foremost among the yogis and the first teacher of the science of Yoga. He is an ideal renuncient and an ideal householder, all in one . It is said that Shiva first imparted his knowledge to Parvati or Shakti, his spouse. Also, for the good of mankind, he taught the science of Yoga to the ancient rishis who passed on this knowledge to the rest of humanity. All yogic and tantric systems consider him as the first Guru. These teachings have come down to us in the form of Agama Sastras. From these teachings, came various traditions which still exist. One of them is the Nava-Nath Tradition founded by Matsyendranath, Gorakshnath and the seven other Gurus of the Nath Tradition, which is still prevalent mostly in North India. Some consider Gorakshnath as an incarnation of Lord Shiva. In the South, it was the Siddha Agastiar or Agastya Muni, who disseminated this knowledge and created a lineage of Siddhas who specialized in Yoga, Tantra, Medicine, Astrology and other sciences. The tradition of 18 Siddhars is well known in South India.

In the yogic culture, Shiva is not known as a god, but as the “Adiyogi” or the “first yogi” – the originator of yoga. He was the one who first put this seed into the human mind. According to the yogic lore, over fifteen thousand years ago, Shiva attained to his full enlightenment and abandoned himself in an intense ecstatic dance upon the Himalayas. When his ecstasy allowed him some movement, he danced wildly. When it became beyond movement, he became utterly still.

Edited By -Gaurav