THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: “Sir, what is your favourite dish?”, little Akshaya Sunil asked with much curiosity. With a little smile on his face, V S Achuthanandan revealed it was Ambalapuzha Paalpayasam.
Achuthanandan was visiting ‘Kilikoodu,’ a vacation camp at the Kerala State Child Welfare Council on Tuesday. In all, 256 children are attending the camp which started on April 5. The camp offers a variety of programmes which include, instrument classes, communicative English class, acting session, drawing classes, magic show, Madhuram Malayalam, exhibition of short movies made by children and discussion with famous personalities for the mental and physical development of kids.
Children welcomed VS with a cap made of coconut leaves. They also rendered songs for him. VS interacted with children for about half an hour. After repeated requests from children, VS sung two lines of the popular song,’ninne kanaan enne kaalum,’ and children started to sing with him. Little Samanvaya, of Class II, surprised him by asking political issues.
VS said he was happy to know children were updated on current issues. Fino S William, a girl of 11 years, asked about ‘his way of celebrating Onam.’ To this, VS said he used to celebrate all festivals in the traditional way and was a great fan of Onasadya. “Will you be Chief Minister again?” for the curious and innocent question of Subin Suresh S B, he relied: “I will not.”
When little Akshaya Sunil asked about his political career, VS said his political life started when he was very young and for more than 70 years he was in the field. When Gowtham S asked about the interests of VS other than politics, he said he was interested in all fields. “The camp aims to spread awareness on the problems being faced by children. We think the session with parents is really important,” said P Sasidharan, programme officer of the camp. The camp is being conducted in the office of state child Welfare Council, Thycaud.