A girl holding out the symbolic dove for a new Kerala - her idea of the ‘Emerging Kerala’ event - is the talk of the town.
Among the other ideas showcased at Le Meridien are the paintings depicting the past and the future of a Kerala blending in harmony. These paintings are all seen through the eyes of the 23 students from the National Institute of Speech and Hearing (NISH), Thiruvananthapuram, an institute working for the welfare of the hearing and speech impaired.
When these students heard about the summit, they felt it would be the right opportunity to present their skills. “We asked the students to paint ‘Emerging Kerala’ as seen through their eyes,” says G Sherly, Head of Department at NISH.
For some of these students who were born physically-challenged since birth, an Emerging Kerala shows cities connected with a mono rail system as can be seen through the sculptures and paintings. For the others, it is a developed world where nature blends with infrastructural activities,where pollution is the thing of the past. “We painted these pictures and created these sculptures from the knowledge we could derive from newspapers and what we learned from our teachers. We keenly observed the projects and that is how these concepts were born,” said Anila, a student of the Bachelor of Fine Arts at NISH.
Some of the sculptures depict the current changes happening in Kerala with the coming of modern technologies.
“We want development to happen but at the same time, our history and culture should not be affected,” the message says. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Chief Minister were highly appreciative of their paintings.
Meanwhile, the designer of the Emerging Kerala logo at the venue expressed his wish to aid Sarath Chandran, NASH student and the boy who sculpted the Emerging Kerala design.