Kaivalyadhama Yoga Institute’s four day ‘International yoga conference – Yoga & Education, which started from December 27, in Lonavala was inaugurated by Shripad Naik, Minister of AYUSH. Swami Adhyatmanandaji gave the the keynote address while Dr SC Khuntia, IAS – Secretary Secondary Education and Literary in Government of India, was the Guest of Honour with Justice BN Srikrishna presiding over the function. Swami Maheshananda and OP Tiwari also graced the occasion. Representations from 12 countries and around 700 national delegates from 15 states within the country are expected to attend the conference. Topics to be discussed include yoga in schools – process, efforts and implementation, experiential paradigm of yoga in education, difficulties in implementing yoga in school education, making traditional yoga relevant today amongst others, standardisation of yoga education: pros and cons.
In his opening remarks, Subodh Tiwari, Organising Secretary of the conference said, “At Kaivalyadhama Yoga Institute our ultimate goal is to see yoga as an inherent part of every curriculum all over the world. We are happy with the support of both the Government of India and the Government of Maharashtra in our endeavour.”
The international conference has official non-financial support from the Department of Higher and Technical Education, Government of Maharashtra. It is an effort of the department to give an opportunity to the teachers/ educationists to upgrade their knowledge of Yoga and deliberate on the topic. The Department of Medical Education and Research, which supervises the Department of AYUSH has also issued a government resolution to encourage the stake holders to attend the conference.
Some of the eminent international names at the Conference are Dr Sat Bir Singh Khalsa, Asst Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, Dr Micheline Flak, France, Göran Boll, Swedish yoga teacher/therapist and Founder of Medi Yoga, Jyoti Bajaj, Director of The Yoga Kids, Canada, Philip Connor, Australia amongst others.
Other dignitaries expected to be present include policy makers like Dr Dhanraj Mane, Director of Higher Education, Maharashtra State, Dr Santosh Panda , Chairman, NCTE, Prof (Dr) WN Gade , Vice-Chancellor, Pune University, Dr Sanjay Chahande, Principal Secretary Higher and Technical Education Government of Maharashtra, Manisha Verma, Project Director RUSA, Dr Uma Vaidya, Vice Chancellor KKSU Ramtek as well as experts like Dr HR Nagendra, Chancellor SVYASA, Dr Rajshekarn Pillai, Former VC IGNOU, Dr Ramesh Bijlani, Dr Ananda Balayogi. The organisers expected that the presence of these policy makers and thought leaders will help get decisions implemented and integrated into the government and education systems.