‘Culture to be promoted for future generations’

Islamabad

Lok Virsa is now focusing and promoting more on traditional culture so that our future generations feel proud of their roots and their culture. Earlier, more emphasis was laid on preservation and documentation but now we are reaching out to the children and artisans by giving them a platform for more cultural and traditional activities. We need more and more cultural activities in the capital so that artists and artisans from all over Pakistan have a place in capital to showcase their creativity and talent to the widest range of public. Our country is bruised and culture is the best medicine for it.

This was stated by Executive Director of Lok Virsa Islamabad Dr. Fauzia Saeed while revealing the strategic directions of Lok Virsa and annual roundup of events to the media here on Wednesday.

“Mere Research and archives is not enough for our future generations but now we need to promote traditional culture too. We are also promoting diversity so that pluralism is introduced to children right from young age. We are engaging more with ethnic communities and spreading out from the capital. We are also doing events with Baluchistan and KPK governments. We have now become the voice of provinces in the centre,” she said.

The ED said that we held programs for Gigit-Baltistan, Hazara community, Indus Cultural Forum and Nauroz was also celebrated here. 

She briefed that the children activities included summer camps and workshop of regional languages. Federal Directorate is cooperating with Lok Virsa and students federal schools are invited to hold workshops on Paper Mache, pottery, truck art and doll making. In addition to this, Children’s Literature Festival was a huge hit and fifteen Children Folk Artists were introduced. Tributes to Habib Jalib and Tufail Niazi were held. Lok Virsa has introduced Mandwa Film Club in which a classic movie is showcased on every Saturday. Pakistan Mother Language Literature Festival and 4th International Literature Festival were also a huge hit. Then there was Mela 2016 which had overwhelming response. We conducted Rubab contest and Qissa Khwani Bazaar festival, Suroz contest, auditions were done nationally and then the finale was held. We are now linking with Smithsonian Institute and they will help us in organizing our archives.

Dr. Fauzia said that the new initiatives include taking the 'Mela' outside Islamabad, strengthening of live streaming of events, strengthening folk dances groups and taking tours of folk child artists. “We will keep on strategizing with universities and cultural institutes in coming years too, because basically we want to propagate the real image of Pakistan,” she said.