Swami Vivekananda’s birthday on January 12 is always celebrated as National Youth Day and the week commencing from that day is known as the National Youth Week. As part of National Youth Week celebrations, the Government of India holds the National Youth Festival every year.
This is an event of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Government of India and is celebrated annually in one of the States in a joint venture.
The youth festival aims to propagate the concept of national integration, spirit of communal harmony, brotherhood, courage and adventure amongst the youth by exhibiting their cultural prowess in a common platform. This is done by organizing gatherings of youth across the country and encouraging them to take part in different activities.
Crucial components of the National Youth Festival are the competitive events. To compete at the national level, the young talents perform their level best to get themselves medals and awards.
To conduct these competitions, eighteen in all disciplines, a team of officers was deployed who managed the competitions, helped in creating logistical arrangements for smooth conduct of competitions, collected and collated the results.
The activities held during the festival include competitive and non-competitive cultural events, martial arts, exhibitions, intellectual discourses, young artists camps, seminars and adventure programmes. The presentation of National Youth Awards also takes place.
Objective:
The National Youth Festival began in 1995 as a major activity under the programme of National Integration Camp (NIC). In collaboration with one of the States and institutions like Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan (NYKS) and the National Service Scheme (NSS), the Government of India conducts this programme every year.
Like the National Youth Festival, States are also encouraged to hold state level, district level and block level youth festivals in the same format as that of the National Youth Festival.
National Youth Festival 2017:
21st National Youth Festival 2017 was organized in Rohtak by the Government of Haryana in collaboration with the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Government of India.
The theme for the current festival was ‘Youth for Digital India’.
The festival was attended by over 10000 youth from across the country.
During 13th to 16th January, 2017 the Festival had a variety of cultural programmes (both competitive and non-competitive), Youth Convention, Suvichar (a lecture series), Exhibitions and adventure programmes, Hasya Kavi Sammelan, Haryanavi Nights etc. followed by Cultural Evening by Hansraj Hans and Raftaar.
