New Delhi/Ranchi: Yoga was the theme and wellness the agenda on Friday as India and the world marked the fifth International Day of Yoga with tens of thousands of people rolling out their mats to stretch and twist, breathe in and breathe out, reach for the skies and bend to touch their toes.
From the UN General Assembly hall to the Indian Parliament premises and from Beijing to Ranchi, enthusiasts of the ancient wellness regime performed ‘asanas’ simple and complex amid chants of ‘Om’ and “Shanti” in several global capitals and across the expanse of India, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the observance of the day. In India, the main event was held at the Jharkhand capital Ranchi with the Prime Minister performing various ‘asanas’ along with 40,000 people at the Prabhat Tara ground. Appealing to people to make yoga an integral part of their lives, Modi said, “We should make efforts to take yoga from cities to villages and tribal areas. Yoga is above religion, caste, colour, gender and region, it is above everything. The essence of yoga has been stable and remained the same — healthy body, stable mind, spirit of oneness. Yoga has provided a perfect blend of knowledge, karma and bhakti,” he told the gathering.
Scenes of mass yoga exercises in open grounds, parks and halls were mirrored in various parts of the country, in the waters of the Digaru river in Arunachal Pradesh where ITBP troopers performed asanas and even in the icy heights of the Himalayas where their colleagues put out their mats on the Vasundhara glacier near Badrinath.
