Kuwait Odisha Association (KOA) has it’s first ever VIRTUAL CULTURAL FEST 2020 with grand success on the eve of the great DIWALI FESTIVAL.
Kuwait Odisha Association (KOA) organized the first ever “Virtual Cultural Fest 2020” under the current pandemic to bring some moments of happiness as well as meet and greet it’s members as it has been several months Odias in Kuwait have not met each other physically. The objective was to spread some positive vibe among the brothers and sisters of Odisha staying in Kuwait..
The event anchor Mr. Tushar Mishra delivered the welcome address and on his request the KOA President, Mr. Girija Shankar Padhy Light the Lamp and announced the Virtual Fest to begin followed by his speech and on his request the Chief Guest Mrs. Tahani Al-Rashidi, Team Leader, Reservoir Studies Team, FD-WK, KOC and the Guest of Honor Shri John Simon, AGM, Al Mulla Exchange, Kuwait addressed the gathering on the virtual platform. Also this virtual fest is attended by Special Guest - Shri Umesh Swika, NRI Banking Head-East, Kotak Mahindra Bank, India besides some Prominent Odia NRI personalities from other GCC Countries and veteran Odia personalities like Mr. Kishore Dash from Oman, Mr. S. K. Senapati, Mr. P K. Nayak, Mr. Gopal Khandelwal and Mr. Ashok Kar from India and Mr. Chandrabhanu Dhalsamant & Mr. Ashok Lenka from Kuwait to name some of them.
The cultural program started with a beautiful Odia Bhajan sang by Mr. Manindra Pratap, then followed by other cultural items like SONG and DANCE items, show talks (RJ Show) by our own local Odia personalities.
On this occasion we had two of our own Comedian artist (Mr. Shankar & Mr. Pragnya) who joined this virtual program from Odisha and presented their humorous items and show talks to make the audience laugh and spawned happiness in all of our mind during this pandemic situation and for a moment all of us forgot the situation we are passing through.
The most prominent and famous dance group named “SIZZLERS” (Mr. Biddu, Mrs. Biddu (Leena Satpathy), Mr. Ajay beura, Mr. Raj Mohapatra, Miss. Sagarika Behera, Miss. Puspalata Rana, Miss. Satyabhama Sahoo) from Odisha who have travelled to many places in the world to perform and show their talent were also a part of this virtual fest and performed with enthralling items starting with a classical dance and ended with an Ollywood remix number.
Also we had the opportunity to hear some amazing Odia songs sung by a renowned and talented artist from music Industry in Odisha, Ms. Ipseeta Panda with Odia Bhajan & some old Odia songs and Bollywood remix songs.
The program was scheduled for around 2.5 hrs. but it went up to around more than 4 hours due to the overwhelming response from the audience as the performances by the local artists and the artists joined from Odisha are so good and powerful to carry on with the crowd despite of that it was virtual.
On this occasion KOA unveiled a miniature version of the SOUVENIR which we used to have a full-fledged version of it during our coveted UTKAL DIWAS function which we used to celebrate on 1st April every year but due to the current Covid situation and social distancing this could not be conducted.
Finally at the end KOA General Secretary Mr. Rakesh Rout gave a powerful Vote of thanks speech to close the function which will be a memorable one for a long time.