Its was 6:30 in the morning, when most of the other were enjoying the sleep of National Holiday, Sankalp volunteer were busy to get ready to catch the bus. They were full of enthusiasm and energy to go out and celebrate our National Festival. As they do every year to spread the love and patriotism around.

This year, on the Republic Day, they decided to go with MindTree, one of the highly social responsible companies, with their TSA (Technical for Social Activity) team to visit a Sri Lankan Refugee School by the name of IGIA (Indira Gandhi Institute Academy). MindTree is supporting this organization from around last 8 year. It was a nice experience for all volunteer to interact with children and new people. We could not visit the old age home as we had to move to our next destination i.e. the Azadi Express.

Perhaps the one moment that we all wait so eagerly for is the unfurling if the National flag. It is a moment that feels so very special. It binds the billion Indians who living in all the different diversities that Mother Nature has to offer flourish and prosper under the Tiranga.

We visited the Azadi Express which was in city on his way to tour India. The information which we got from mails and internet kept us on our toes, eagerly waiting to see the Azadi Express. After reaching, we were amazed by the crowd turn over. There were thousands of visitor already waiting for their turn to see the beauty of Azadi Express. We queue up in the line without wasting another second and the enthusiasm and eagerness to go inside kept encouraging us to wait 3.5 hour in a queue. After the long wait we were finally step inside the train. The first look of train itself justify the long waiting time. We got a feeling of the rich and diversify culture of India as we pass first few boogies. We could see the hard work behind this project. As we crossed a few boogie we saw some rarest pictures and information on First war of Independence 1857.

Some of the facts shown were new to all the volunteers. As we proceed further in the train, the time frame of Indian freedom also shifted from 1857 to 1947. There was rare information about the Indian struggle for freedom. Last few boogies were showing the development and growth of India after Independence. After the visit all the volunteer were satisfied and happy by the visit. Every moment of the five hours we spent in there were worth it.

I must say people behind this project must have work hard for the collect the rare of rare of picture and information. We all feel the lack of time to digest all the information displayed in the train. We all wish we were permitted to spend as much time as we wanted.

We would like to thank Govt. of India especially Ministry of Information and Broadcasting for the beautiful initiative. Also volunteer express their views on how this idea can be taken ahead.

The volunteers who were the part of program were:

Arpana, Lalith, Sujata, Vibha, Geetesh, Jayesh, Rajat, Amrita, Manjunath, Supriya, Shweta, Priya.