Familymaker Conference & Awards

Familymaker Conference and Award Program was organized by Vision Search, Khushigram Foundation and Global Peace Foundation India at Gandhi Peace Foundation, New Delhi on April 28, 2024.

The event concluded with a deep discussion on families and relationships. People from all walks of life attended the event. Mothers & Homemakers were felicitated with awards to appreciate the value of their work.

Inspiring speeches from Guest of Honours motivated the listeners and the panelists delved into the depth of their topics and gave valuable insights. Cultural performance added color to the event and stirred the soul. Mona Mehra’s Book ‘Home- The missing Piece/ Peace’ was launched. Overall, the event was a great success.

In the inaugural session, Guest of honor Dr. Rashmi Singh, Commissioner Hospitality and Protocol, J&K, said that family is a truth in which living with equal expectations in relationships is essential, relationships are breathing with breath, while machines do not breathe. She said that her mother did not differentiate between her son and daughter. Expectation today is still equality in families, awareness is needed on subjects like nutrition levels, hemoglobin, enrollment in education, and gender ratios. Former Special Director, CBI, Mr. D.C. Jain, highlighting the importance of the joint family system, said that the household system should be such that work can be done together, relationships can be maintained, and financial independence is necessary. Dr. Markandey Rai, President of the Global Peace Foundation India, expressing concern over the increase in incidents of family breakdowns, said that the concept of the Familymaker should be turned into a movement. He emphasized the need to do a lot for gender equality. He said that to create a generous character for Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, one should consider how the feeling of mine will end, only then can families be safe and protected. He reiterated the principles of perfection over competition in families. Dr. Jwala Prasad, Director, Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti, said that today, homes have become like palaces, but gods are not becoming deities in homes, he elaborated extensively on the feelings of family and global family in the context of Indian culture. Delhi President of the National Self-Respect Movement, Ms. Sukarma Choudhary, said that nature will survive, culture will survive, and if culture survives, the family will survive, the family will survive, then happiness will survive, there is a need today to save families. Sumit Yadav, MD SYY Infra joined the program later and talked about the importance of family and how RWA should also be roped in to take the awards to grassroot.

Mona Mehra, Founder of Vision Search in her theme address made everyone present affirm that we all are homemakers and Familymakers as none can survive without a home and family. She also presented the concept of the Familymaker Award Program, saying that the value of the family that is formed cannot be assessed as the work of a homemaker is invaluable. Ajit Kumar, the founder of Khushigram, while conducting the event, said that today it is necessary that we all recognize the importance of relationships and establish possibilities of living with equality in relationships. In this session, recognizing the special contributions to keeping the family together, there were 14 Familymaker awardees who were given the awards. Dr. Monica Nagpal, Shikha Goyal, Nishant Bhardwaj, Anjana Anand, Aartei Pandey, Anjali Mehra, Priyanka and Indramohan Yadav, Dr. Karuna Bhalla, Madhu Lata Gupta, Vandana Gupta , Anjali Gupta, Indramani Sharma , Sonia Jaitley and Reva Banka, they were honored with the Family Maker Award. The jury members of this honor were Dr. Ganesh Gautam, Dr. Anita Choudhary, Mr. Aniruddh Agrawal, and Ms. Asha Mohini.

In the form of a panel discussion, in the first session, experts in ‘Nurturing and Developing Emotional Intelligence EQ in Families’ expressed their thoughts. Aarti Ahluwalia, UN representative said that there are problems of discrimination and inequality in society, there is no opportunity for women representatives to work in the village, while it should be that everyone gets equal opportunities. The child born is not only the mother’s but also the society’s. Professor of Lady Irwin college, Aparna Khanna said that we understand relationships, emotions, and feelings, but the real application of life is how to do it, homemakers play a major role in this.

Researcher and educator, Dr. Chand Bharadwaj presented the philosophical concepts of mind, body, and creative intelligence, and highlighted the importance of knowledge. He said that if attention is paid to the qualities of the soul such as love, compassion, forgiveness, etc., then life can be lived with balance. Counselling Psychologist, Seema Singh said that for success, only wealth, knowledge, and health are not necessary, there is some deficiency in it because even after achieving it, when they come home, they feel emptiness and loneliness.

Seema Singh clarified the dimensions of EQ. Transformation and Consciousness catalyst, Sandeep Gupta said that for children, parents are gods, so parents should pay attention to their behavior because it influences children, children are not an extension of parents, and they should get the opportunity to develop with freedom. Giving knowledge when they need ointment is not right. Educationist and artist, Vasudha Arora said that knowledge, meditation, and respect are in harmony and balance in these three dimensions, emotional balance is achieved. This session was moderated by Dr. Surendra Pathak, consultant Global Peace Foundation India.

The panel discussion 2, Kumar Amitabh, Founder Arkpatra and Co-Founder Khushigram said that in the Indian society, work and roles were well defined. He added that relationships were very important, and livelihoods were closer to nature and took care of health also. People worked together and this was the reason for Sustainable Development of Bharat. Prof KK Upadhyay, Head CSR, BIMTECH pointed out that times are good and people and institutions just need to draw their boundaries. This helps them be happy as people are free today. Ranju Minhas, Social & Green Entrepreneur and Trainer gave some anecdotes from her life to explain how practical and right kind of training was important to inculcate values in children as they would take care of the family and society and earn livelihoods in Sustainable manner.Vijay Kumar Katti, explained how to practice sustainability and said that plants were the best friends. He asked people to be more with nature and recognize plants.Dr Shuchi Bharti, Supreme Court Advocate and Social Activist spoke of Cognitive and Emotional labour and said they should be properly accounted for and given due value. She also said that often work at home or in family is invisible to many people and it should be identified and recognized as gender balance is important for Sustainable Development. Ajit Kumar, MD, Khushigram Foundation & CEO, Radiance Media while moderating the session endorsed Amitabh’s suggestion for platform for Sustainable Goods and Services and told about the work of Khushigram in this direction including membership and Cluster based Approach for Sustainable Development and Happiness with Multi Stakeholder approach in 3 districts of Delhi NCR to start with.

The panel discussion 3 on ‘Respect, Pride and Home Management’ was moderated by Mona Mehra. Dr. Monica Nagpal, Hopeprenuer and Radical Pause coach, gave a heart touching keynote speech and elaborated on the importance of just being, visibility and self-expression of homemakers. Dr. Karuna Bhalla, ex-principal and educationist talked about the importance of education and how it starts from our homes and helps in building character.National advisor of Rashtriya Sainik Sansthan, Sarvesh Mittal, stated that education without sanskar or values is of no use as it creates valueless humans which are a problem to society. Nishant Bhardwaj, a male homemaker stated that society is very harsh and disrespectful to males if they do work in a home and there is no acceptance of any work done in a Home and this needs to change. Indramohan Kumar stated that a homemaker does a lot of work and needs to be respected for their contributions.

The program was organized by the organizing committee members Mona Mehra, Founder Vision Search, Ajit Kumar, Founder Khushigramand Dr. Surendra Pathak, Advisor GPF India and Chief Researcher of the Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam Project.