A modern Santiniketan

On Saturday, a fruit juice and ghee sweet in the morning meant it was time for a good workout. By the time the chores were done it was too late for a run, which left biking as the only option. Where do I bike to? Criteria: should be at least a 40 KM round trip and be a worthy place to visit. I settled on the Prakriya Green Wisdom school (http://www.prakriyaschool.org/) as a destination. It was about 25KM from the house, and about 10 KM beyond the smog-noise bubble of the city. So that gave me 20 KM of fresh air cycling.

The school sounded like an interesting place, as a part of its vision indicates: Prakriya -"the green wisdom school", was envisioned as a school that seriously respects the wisdom of nature within ourselves as well as in our environment. It was also the HQ of the Bhoomi Network, an organization that publishes the Eternal Bhoomi magazine, a real page-turner for anyone interested in the social questions of today.  I needed to renew the subscription and it felt better to hand deliver the check than lose it to the Indian Postal Labyrinth.

So the trip seemed to meet many purposes, and I was set on it. The only hitch was that it was high noon when I started so I was going to have to really sweat it out.

20 KM and a couple of wrong turns later, I was on a winding "kaccha" road to the school. The road was tough but picturesque. A typical village, huge Raavi trees, decorated ant hills, white doves...a treat for the eyes.

The school was definitely worth the visit. Some pleasing features:

- No imposing multi-storey structures.
- Lots of community interaction spots like amphitheatres, benches under trees etc.
- A good bit of emphasis on eduction through story telling, arts and crafts.
- Wide playgrounds, sporting courts (basketball etc).
- A large organic garden
- "Green wisdom" abounds: Going beyond evils of plastic etc, there seemed to be a huge emphasis on moral education (remember that boring class that none of us wanted to attend in school?)
- There was an organic terrace gardening class going on in the garden for a few citizens of the city. From the bit I listened to, it seemed to be quite practical

In all, the school seemed to match the mental picture one has of Santiniketan. But it follows a regular ICSE curriculum.


The staff seemed to be bemused that someone would travel that far to renew a subscription for their magazine. I met Seeta AnanthSivan, the editor of the Bhoomi magazine, headmistress and founder of the school and complimented her on her excellent writing (she is really good!). She talked about how it is tough to  get new folks to subscribe to the mag- the community of folks who are interested in sustainability seems fairly static in size in India.

I reached home at about 5:15, utterly exhausted after about 60 KM of cycling in the hot sun. I rewarded myself with a vada pav and a chocolate thick shake, thus undoing all the good work of the day. I restricted myself to curd rice for dinner though.

So, a modern Santiniketan in Bangalore: If you had a chance, would you enroll your children there?