International Longevity Centre Global Alliance - Designing the Future of Ageing

6th August 2020

ILC-India organized an online poetry competition on the topic of “Inter-generational Solidarity-Lockdown special” for older people. Entrants were requested to express themselves through their original poems and share their experiences of being with the family during lockdown and under the stressful situation of the Covid-19 pandemic.

ILC-I has always supported the concept of “Intergenerational Solidarity” in every possible way. Hence, the ILC-I team decided to conduct an online poetry competition on the topic of “Intergenerational Solidarity-Lockdown Special” exclusively for older people.

ILC-I received a very good response as well as a good feedback that such motivation through this kind of a competition gave an immense energy to the seniors to write, read, think and express themselves in a creative way. All across the state of Maharashtra we received many poems in Marathi and English. The seniors had written about their routine during the lockdown period, how their family members helped them learn a new skill, how mobile phones and computers kept them active, how Google duo and Zoom calls helped to maintain their connection with other seniors across states. Some poems even expressed their gratitude for this opportunity to spend quality time with their loved ones at home.

It was overwhelming to see different shades of thoughts expressed by the participants for their family members. All the participants were given e-certificates for participating in the competition. The winner of the competition, Ms. Deepa Paradkar from Pune, recorded her poem with her family members. The video is available on the ILC-India YouTube channel.