August month is celebrated as month of NT-DNT Vimukta Din, to mark 31 August when these communities gained their independance from the offensive, vengeful and wicked criminalization forced upon them, first by colonial British rulers and continued by independant Indian administration.
1st August 2021 was a historic beginning for us, when NT and other marginalized youth came together to remember the day and its history. This was a Youth powered celebration with NT-DNT Gadiya Lohar Ghisadi, Banjara, and other marginalized youth from different parts of Thane district learnt about the rich NT-DNT history, skills, inventions, creations, science, technology and made collages based on unique NT-DNT arts & occupations. The youth engaged with pride and dignity with their social and cultural capital – diverse and intellectually, creatively rich occupations of ironsmithy, music, dance, art, showmanship, gymnastics, sports, weaponry, each community’s secret sign languages once used to great effect against the British! Unfortunately, NT youth have only heard of their histories, arts, crafts and occupations negatively from the outside world. Today was a beginning where they reclaimed their histories with the dignity that their past deserves.
A Career counselling session was also organized, where more than technical aspects, the focus was on motivation & confidence building of these first generation learners about their rich cultural capital, and the practical career avenues open to them.
Finally, the day ended with a historic celebration of friendship (since it was also Frienship Day) across communities, genders, regions, languages!