Chennai: A rapid sequenceof yogasanas for an hour on huge ice blocks and asanas with silambam, a traditional Tamil martial arts, marked the sixth International Day of Yogacelebrations in Tamil Nadu on Sunday.
The Coronavirus pandemic did not appear to dampen the spirit of scores of yoga enthusiasts who observed the day while strictly maintaining social distancing and wearing masks.
Yoga instructor Vijayakumar performedseveral asanas on huge ice blocks in Cuddalore as his students and a few onlookers watched the event in rapt attention.
They strictly adhered to social distancing and wore masks during the event.
In Dharmapuri, an agriculture graduate, who also conducts a coach centre for Sillambam, demonstrated that yoga can also be performed by holding a stick.
“I wanted to utilise the International Yoga Day to portray that our ancient martial arts of Silambam could also be used while performing yogasanas,” said Shanmugam, the Silambam exponent-cum-yoga enthusiast.
He performed’Vrukshana’, ‘Sukhasana’ and even ‘Bhujangasana’, holding the silambam at Nallampatti village.
While the Regional directorate of NSS Chennais Avinashlingam Womens University unit observed the day maintaining social distancing,members of theNCC at Vel Tech University performed yoga online on the occasion.
The US Consulate Chennai posted a throwback video (2017) featuring students from Chennais Ramakrishna Mission Students Home, Mylapore, showing us how #yoga connects both the mind and body #Staysafe #Stayhealthy #YogaDay2020 on its official twitter account.
The Vidyamandir conducted free online yoga classes asking people to stay healthy and fit both physically and mentally, on its Facebook and Youtube channels:http://cb.lk/vmc/fbandhttp://cb.lk/vmc/yt.