Yuva Vikas Kendra in Pokhara, Nepal
Yuva Vikas Kendra or Youth Development Centre, in Pokhara, Nepal, was founded in November 2016. Set amidst the breathtakingly scenic backdrop of Annapurna range of the mighty Himalayas, Pokhara is the second largest city in Nepal. Located east of Nepal’s capital Kathmandu, it is a popular tourist destination, 25 minutes by flight from Kathmandu.
We established this Centre in collaboration with Pragyik Vidyarthi Parishad (PVP), a Not for Profit student organization, in Nepal. PVP is also an affiliate of Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh Nepal.
This Centre in Pokhara engages Nepalese Youth in University/High School in Self-Development programs in Pokhara, Damauli, Gorkha and Lamjung. The centre is run solely by support of donors. The mission of the centre is to :
- create the next generation of Nepalese youth leadership in various areas of society.
- create committed citizens that will selflessly serve Nepal, its heritage and culture.
- engage youth in Seva (selfless projects) in Nepal including disaster relief and re-construction activities.
Recently, we have extended the self-development activities to younger children in primary and high school, on a trial basis, with plans to formalize it as we move forward. To enable this, we have recruited an Acharya (trained Hindu teacher of Vedanta) and coordinator, trained by Chinmaya Mission, with 7 years of experience of running similar programs and camps, in India. The presence of the Acharya, who is also from Nepal, helps us fill the philosophical knowledge gap at the centre and is a huge value add to our mission . This will help our mission by engaging youth earlier in life, creating a bigger impact in society.
With support from a few donors, the centre currently comprises a computer training facility, a multi-media meeting room for presentations and training. It also hosts 8 full time student volunteers, who live at the facility and are actively involved in coordination and conduct of the activities. These are unpaid volunteers, students in University themselves, who outside of schools hours, spend all of their time in serving society, receive training constantly, training others constantly, committed to serving and passionate about Nepal and its heritage. Most of them took active part in relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts following the massive earthquake and subsequent disaster that hit Nepal in April 2015.
The volunteers travel to various colleges in the area comprising
- Heritage Lectures, Interactive Workshops, including Knowledge Tests.
- Public Speaking training sessions.
- Yoga, Meditation & Martial Arts training.
Travel to certain remote areas through rough terrain, hills and inclement weather conditions, in Nepal is slow and difficult, but our volunteers persist. As of September 2017, in less than a year, our volunteers have been able to take these programs to 1400 students in Pokhara, 3000 students in Damauli, 400 students in Gorkha and about 100 in Lamjung.
This is followed up by a more focused in-house training for a smaller subset of trainees at the Pokhara centre, in areas listed above with addition of Computer Training, which includes basic programming, use of Computer Applications. Approximately 500 students have gone through this program in the last year.
All of the above self-development training to students is provided free of charge.
Our Youth volunteers/leaders go through training themselves through various training sessions organized by Pragyik Vidyarthi Parishad, mentoring via external resources, daily Sadhana (practices), Vedantic training by the resident Acharya etc.
The mission to empower our next generation with leadership skills, help build a strong society based on values and preserve Nepal’s ancient heritage cannot be done without financial support of our donors. Sustenance of a centre, its rental, utility costs, procuring equipment for training/communication, training resource costs, travel costs for volunteers, providing food at the centre to our unpaid student volunteers etc., to help run these activities described above, is mostly funded mostly via private donors in Canada, with assistance from a few donors in Dubai, India & locally in Nepal.
While our short term plan is to strengthen our operations in Pokhara and open a new centre in Damauli, in the long term we would like to open many more of such centres leveraging our trained volunteers base to lead and generate more volunteers and leaders. Financial support to maintain what he have going and start new projects is obviously critical to all of this.
Those who wish to know more about these programs or visit this centre in Nepal or provide financial support to this initiative, please Contact Us