This Onam promises to be a memorable one for the students of Government Higher Secondary School for Girls, Cotton Hill, here.
A day after the school first-term examinations conclude and before the students begin their Onam break, the school will celebrate Onam on September 2 with a host of programmes.
Students will create colourful Athappookkalam units in every division from Classes 5 to 12 in the morning. School authorities expect nearly 101 Athapookkalam units to be made. Teachers and non-teaching staff will get together to create an Athapookkalam on their own.
As the Onam festivities are intended to involve every student, those not involved in making Athapookkalam will take part in the cultural programmes. These are all group events intended to maximise student participation.
Once the stage programmes conclude, it will be time for another highlight of Onam—the traditional Onasadya. The feast will be cooked at the school itself, and served on plantain leaves to nearly 4,200 students, including the newly arrived Plus One higher secondary students. The food will be served in six or seven rounds in a hall that can seat around 700 students at a time, say the school authorities.
In the run-up to the sadya, the school will conduct a Kalavara nirakkal in which students can voluntarily contribute vegetables of their choice for the Onasadya. The vegetable collection will begin a day or two before and be completed by September 1. Students would be able to pitch in with vegetables that do not spoil easily in whatever quantity they like. These will be stored in a room set up as the kalavara.
Only whatever that is not available in the kalavara will need to be purchased for the sadya or arranged through sponsorship.
Such a massive celebration has not been organised in the school recently, say the authorities, adding that it will be everything that the Onam festival embodies.
