UP varsity to start 'garbha sanskar' training course

An Uttar Pradesh university has decided to start a training course in 'garbha sanskar' (teaching children while they are in their mothers' womb) to ensure that children turn out to be good citizens.

Ayodhya-based Avadh University will launch the six-month long training course from the next academic session, according to the university officials.

The module of the course, which had been designed by the Yoga department of the university, includes activities that inculcate good 'sanskar' in the foetus.

During the training, the expecting mothers would be taught how to conduct themselves during the period of pregnancy.

"If the course succeeds in its objectives, it will, in a way, be reinventing our ancient methods of imbibing in the child the qualities we want when they are inside their mother's womb," said a university official.

UP Governor Anandiben Patel had suggested to the state universities to start such a course.

"The womb of the mother is the first school of the child... Whatever the mother does affects the child also,'' Anandiben had said at a function a few months ago.

The governor had cited the example of Abhimanyu, a character in the Mahabharata, who was the son of Arjuna, one of the Pandavas, and had learnt the art of demolishing the 'chakravyuha' (a complicated battle strategy) inside his mother's womb from his father, who was narrating the same to Subhadra, his wife.

Abhimanyu managed to break seven gates of 'chakravyuha' but was trapped in the last one and was ultimately killed.

According to Mahabharata, Subhadra had fallen asleep, when Arjuna was narrating as to how to break the eighth gate.

Barely a few days ago, the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) was in the limelight after it announced that it would start a course in 'Bhoot Vidya'.

Many took it as the study of ghosts but the BHU officials made it clear that it concerned the study of the psychosomatic disorders.

There was also a suggestion to change the nomenclature of the course.