Municipal school kids to get fitter, starting today

Mumbai: Municipal schools across Mumbai will start a new fitness regime from Wednesday, as a 30-minute-long rigorous fitness exercise, Kasrat, will be inaugurated for children in the age group of 13-16 years (Class 8 to Class 10) to help their overall growth and development. The programme will be inaugurated at the Worli seaface municipal school on Wednesday, and will then be added to the curriculum in other schools within a week.

Mahesh Palkar, education officer of the BMC, said, “This is a unique way to de-stress students. The concept of Kasrat is very close to the western concept of aerobics. Students will be taught free style dance exercise in rhythm with music beats, which is a complete body stretching exercise for relaxing the body and mind. This will de-stress their minds and channelise their attention back to studies.” Mr Palkar said, “We are not sure if this will be conducted in schools every morning, or only during the physical training lectures of the students. We are yet to figure that out.”

Yuva Sena chief Aaditya Thackeray will inaugurate the programme on Wednesday at Worli municipality school. After Wednesday’s inauguration of the programme, physical training teachers from all schools will be given a day-long training session to conduct exercises.

Following this, the regime will be started in all other BMC schools as well. The BMC began planning the regime 15 days ago, and consulted many fitness experts to draft the schedule. It plans to introduce this as part of the daily routine in all municipal schools.

Well-planned move:

• The programme will be inaugurated at the Worli seaface municipal school on Wednesday, and will then be added to the curriculum in other schools within a week.
• The programme is for children between 13 to 16 years.
• Yuva Sena chief Aaditya Thackeray will inaugurate the programme.
• BMC began planning the regime 15 days ago, and consulted fitness experts to draft the schedule.