Prime Minister Narendra Modi announces “My Life My Yoga” Video Blogging contest in Man Ki Baat

New Delhi: Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India today called upon one and all to participate in the “My Life – My Yoga”(also called “Jeevan Yoga”) Video Blogging Contest, a joint effort by the Ministry of AYUSH and the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), during the course of his monthly Mann Ki Baat address to the nation. The contest focuses on the transformative impact of Yoga on the lives of individuals, and comes as one of the activities related to the observation of the sixth International Day of Yoga (IDY) coming up on 21st June 2020. The contest has gone live on the social media handles of the Ministry of AYUSH today, 31 May 2020.

The observation of IDY in the past years has been marked by thousands of harmonious mass demonstrations of Yoga in public places. Due to the contagious nature of COVID-19, no mass gathering would be advisable this year. Hence, this year the Ministry is encouraging the people to practice Yoga at their homes, with participation from the entire family. Through the My Life – My Yoga video blogging competition, the Ministry of AYUSH and ICCR seek to raise awareness about Yoga and to inspire people to prepare for and become active participants in the observation of IDY 2020. The contest will support participation via the social media platforms of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Video contest will be open to participants from all countries.

The contest will run in two legs. First leg consisting of an international video blogging contest, wherein the winners will be picked within a country. This will be followed by global prize winners who will be selected from winners from different countries.

Entries can be submitted by participants under three categories covering youth (aged under 18), adults (above 18 years) and yoga professionals, and further, separately for male and female contestants. This makes it a total of six categories in all. For the India contestants, prizes worth Rs. 1 lakh, 50K and 25K for 1st, 2nd and 3rd ranking within each of the categories have been announced within the first leg. Details of the global prizes will be announced shortly on the Yoga Portal of Ministry of AYUSH.

This contest is open to all participants across the world. To enter into the contest the participants are required to upload a 3 minutes duration video of 3 Yogic practices (kriya, asana, pranayama, bandha or mudra), including a short video message/ description on how the said Yogic practices influenced their life. The video may be uploaded on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram with the contest hashtag #MyLifeMyYogaINDIA and appropriate category hashtag. Detailed guidelines for participation can be found on the Yoga Portal of Ministry of AYUSH(https://yoga.ayush.gov.in/yoga/).

The announcement of the contest by PM has generated tremendous curiosity about and interest in it. The Ministry of AYUSH is confident that this interest would convert into significant public health gains, as the positive impact of Yoga in the management of many aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic situation is by now well accepted.