India's 75th Independence Day celebration - ISW (India Society of Worcester)

Remembering our past is extremely important. But we also have to think about building our future. Let's do everything to keep our freedom and carry it through the years. Happy Independence Day!"

As the above quote says ISW is here to remember our past couple years of pandemic but to think positive and spread the happiness and build our future by gathering our community together to celebrate our Independence Day after 2 years of gap due to COVID-19.

India's 75th Independence Day was celebrated by our ISW community at the grand venue of DCU Center-Worcester past Saturday, August 6th.

The program was filled up with captivating cultural programs, Ethnic shopping vendors and local business booths, Play area for kids, Art fair, Food vendors, Health stop and many more attractions.

The entire day's event kicked off by an incredible Parade consisting of 'Dhol Tasha Lezim' performance by our community volunteer enthusiasts. Great formations of Lezim players and Dhol Tasha players caught the eye of each of the spectators there.

This year's cultural program theme was 'Panchatatva - 5 elements of nature - Earth, Water, Fire, Air, and Space. The stage performances included presentations by different groups like Natyamani School of Dance, Ekta's Dance Academy, Aangikam Dance Academy, Performing arts of New England, ISW Cultural committee, Bolly Beatzz, etc. Some admirable performances also involved our Humrahee group where seniors who are young at heart stepped up the stage to celebrate an independence by singing medley of Patriotic songs in full energy and enthusiasm.

The Bazaar section of this event was extremely appreciated by attendees where one could enjoy the shopping of ethnic clothings and accessories from local business, one could enjoy visiting many non profit organization booth with many free giveaways or get  more information of their work . Many folks enjoyed and loved eating delicious Indian food from multiple food vendors like Bawarchi andChennai Express.

The kids zone near the entrance of the DCU center had lots of fun elements such as cotton candy, popcorn, play area, face painting and more.

This year ISW put forth beautiful artwork done by our community artists and some professional artists. The art fair had a lot of artistic bags, purses, architectural designed paintings, some great acrylic paintings, and madhubani paintings.

One of our ISW's unique features of such events is a booth for Health Stop. ISW Health Stop offered free COVID vaccines during this event and many attendees took advantage of the same.

The guest of honor for the event was Worcester Mayor Joseph Petty who graciously handed out ISW scholarships to the youth who had achieved academic as well community work excellence in their high school career.

The full day event ran from 1:00 PM to 7:00 PM with more than 3000 attendees at the DCU center. Around 35 committee members and more than 100 volunteers were working towards this event for 3 months. The organization has earned one more  successful feather in their hat. Thanks to all the volunteers, participants and vendors.

Big shout out to the sponsors of this event - DCU Bank, UNI Bank, eClinicalWorks, and Webster five.

Jai Hind!

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