Trenton,
New Jersey
The Federation of Indian Associations, NY NJ CT (FIA)
organized the 36th annual Dance Pe Chance, a dance competition, celebrating
India’s 71st Republic Day, at
the Patriots War Memorial Theatre in Trenton,
New Jersey, January 25.
Twenty one performances by the more than 500 artists set
a new high for FIA as it sores past the milestone of having touched the lives of
over 180,00 children via this cultural event spanning over 3 decades.
Celebrity judges and distinguished invitees included Shatrughna
Sinha, Deputy Consul General, actor and kathak dancer Prachee Shah Pandya, actor
and athlete Prachi Tehlan and the super 30 fame mathematical maestro Anand
Kumar, who was the chief guest.
The FIA, one of the oldest and the largest nonprofit umbrella
organizations of the Indian diaspora aims to promote the second generation
with the cultural event.
Students from various dance schools of different states
participated in the competition. Thirteen dance schools performed in front of a
full crowd in four categories: minor, junior, senior and adult. Aum Dance
Creations, Arya Dance Academy,
Aatma Performing Arts, B2Z Dance School, Dancing Shiva, Nruthu Aaloka Dance
Vision, Nirmiti School of Dance, Nritya Creations, Shake it up dance school,
Dance4Ever, Taal Institute of Performing Arts, Dansation, and Taraang with
Mitali were among the schools which participated.
The event commenced with the National Anthems of US
and India. In
his welcome address DPC chair Saurin Parikh welcomed the audience and applauded
the artists and their parents and choreographers. He
dedicated this year’s competition in
honor of the more than180,00 who had participated in earlier years.
The community event also honored the dignitaries in
attendance, judges and guests. It also witnessed the traditional ceremony of
oath taking of the new executive committee of FIA consisting of Anil Bansal, president; Himanshu
Bhatia, executive vice president; Saurin Parikh, vice president; Praveen
Bansal, general secretary; Amit Ringasia, treasurer; Alok Kumar, immediate
past president and Mardavi Patel, joint secretary.
The oath was administered by Deputy Consul General Sinha
who welcomed the new team. He appreciated the role FIA has played in
the community for 49 years. He noted that the consulate and FIA working in sync is pivotal for the Indian
diaspora.
Rajpal Bath, a representative from New Jersey Governor’s
office, administered the oath to two of the new members. FIA added Srujal Parikh, and Andy Bhatia, both
past presidents to the board of trustees.
Chairman Ramesh Patel recognized the support of the FIA
Board, consisting of e distinguished community leaders including Ramesh
Patel, Padma Shri H R Shah, Padma Shri Dr. Sudhir Parikh,
Albert Jasani, Ram Gadhavi, Dipak Patel, Chandrakant Trivedi, Pravin
Pandhi, Ankur Vaidya, Jayesh Patel and Yash Paul Soi.
New president Anil Bansal thanked the 2019 team and
expressed his gratitude for the trust placed on him by the FIA fraternity in
electing him to lead in 2020 and assured continued engagement with the diaspora
assistance programs as well as the grand celebrations to mark FIA’s 50 years of
existence.
The judges were an array of talented
personalities including Anindita Nanda, an exponent of Odissi,
internationally-acclaimed classical dancer and an Indian vocalist,
Paromita Chakravarty an accomplished Bharatnatyam dancer, theater artist
and choreographer, Pranaya Akula, trained in Bharatnatyam and a dance teacher,
and Swati Vaishnav, the owner of a dance academy Nartan Rang Dance Dance
Academy who have won multiple dance competitions both nationally and
internationally.
The event was sponsored by Radio Mirchi, Air India,
Republic TV, TV Asia, Parikh Worldwide Media & South Asian Times.
FIA has launched an bi-weekly diaspora news mailer and
performed a beta app test for popular audience voting app which saw an
accumulated total of over 7000 votes cast.
The app vote scores were not included due to the beta
version of the app being tested. FIA plans to incorporate this as a part
of the counted vote score in the coming competitions.
Concluding with the announcement of results, FIA also
honored all the dancers, choreographers and judges with cash prizes, mementos,
and certificates.
