Yuva Parliament in Chandigarh

Yuva Parliament is a young people's movement that has recently been launched in Chandigarh. As they explore their journey and process of discovery, they are being supported and mentored by The Youth Parliament in New Delhi throughout this process. Later on in August, both organizations will visit each other, to train, share best practices and learn! We congratulate them for conducting their first successful session!


Continuing on the objective of ‘Changing Mindsets’ & ‘Initiating Volunteerism’ amongst the Youth of today, We Volunteer has initiated a concept named Yuva Parliament for the first time in the city.

Yuva Parliament, is a platform for the youth of Chandigarh to come together and Connect - Discuss – Formulate action plans on how the youth can impact the society. The first session was held on 29^th June, 2007 at Punjab Kala Bhawan.

The idea behind Yuva Parliament is to bring together the youth from sundry domains and provide them with a common forum where they can share their views and opinions on the most imperative issues in Chandigarh and also formulate methodologies to work collectively to alleviate the problems.

The basic idea lies in letting the participants decide how they can impact the society in their own ways, using their own areas of interest or profession.

So, to create a CHANGE you need not wear a khadi-kurta, carry a jhola & set off to the slums. Society can be impacted in a lot many other ways & that’s what We Volunteer is working on, to redefine what people call “Social Work”!

For the first session, the major umbrella domains were,

• Performing and Visual arts
• Creative arts
• Media
• Sciences
• Activism
• Miscellaneous

85 participants from the above domains were present at the first session. Youth Icons, like Dr. Gaurav Chabbra (spearheading an NGO called Hum Log in Chandigarh and also winner at the WHO short film awards, for his film titled “MudCake”, Mr. Gaurav Gaur, a leading social activist in Chandigarh were present at the session.

The session had an NGO Resource Panel chaired by the heads of various progressive NGOs in Chandigarh. The chair comprised of Col. Bedi (YTTS), Mr. Bhullar(Educare), Mrs Harleen Kohli(CEVA), Mr Ajit Tomar(a leading RTI activist from Burning Brains Society).

The first session started with an open house discussion on the impending issues that are affecting the society today. Issues related to Depression problems in youth, Slum Education, HIV/AIDS, child beggars, and environment formed the crux of the debate.

The second stage of the session comprised of the youth being divided amongst teams based on their areas of interest, that were Performing & Creative Arts, Activism, Health & Sciences & Media. The teams chose their own issues , brainstormed on them, discussed & then formulated Action Plans to find solutions to these issues.

It was really an interesting view to see the youth being so actively involved in the discussion & formulation, being eager to contribute their share.

The last stage was the presentation of the Action Plans formulated by all teams, one by one, to the dignitaries present there as well as the parliament. The parliament was open to suggest any modifications for the plans or to offer any help with the resources the teams would need during the execution of the plans. The projects were critically analyzed by the dignitaries. The dignitaries proposed to provide support and resources for the projects of the youth.

The parliament session was declared closed after a small presentation on Volunteerism 2.0, which is all about redefining how people take the term Social Work.

Not a complete instantaneous impact, but “a Perfect Start” is what we could call it. The work for next session has already begun. Its going to get BIGGER & BETTER each time.

“CHANGE INITIATED”

- Preet Arjun