Ahmedabad: Cantonment walls to get a valiant makeover

The barren walls outside the Army cantonment leading to the airport have received a colourful and awe-inspiring makeover, all thanks to students of Riverside School. The Indian Army has roped in students of Class V and VI to work on beautifying the walls. Accordingly, nearly 18 students have been hard at work since six weeks, painting artistic murals on these walls.

As part of their curriculum, students have to participate in a “client project”, which gives them real-life experiences of dealing with clients. “Client projects involve a lot of activities done by the students, like language, script, research, calculation, budget, understanding history, issues, interacting with people, etc. The students even create a proposal for the client. As part of this project, we approached the CEO of the Cantonment Board, and the idea of revamping the walls came up during this discussion,” said Vinita Modi, who along with Meera Joshi, mentored the students on the project.

“Officials were kind enough to trust the children and allow them to create stories as part of their art. The students were trained by artists, and have curated stories dealing with gratitude, vehicles the Army uses, their training modules, rigour, poems, etc.,” she added.

The students are also excited about the project. Aayreen Baagwala, a student of Class VI, said, “This project involved the process of ‘feel, imagine, do, share’. We learnt so many facts and stories about the Army, especially the role of the Ahmedabad cantonment during the 1970 India-Pakistan war.”

“We were also told real stories of soldiers living in Siachen, and how they eat the same food every day. These stories make us feel more thankful for what we have here. I was part of the group researching women’s role in the Army, and I found that there is a lot of equality today. One of the murals we made shows how the brave women of the Army work,” Baagwala said.

Client projects also taught the students about deadlines and the value of discipline, and about not getting demotivated when their ideas get rejected. Every day, the students invest 1.5 hours to beautify the stretch. While the stretch is 2.5 kms long, the students have also decided to design 80 such pieces.

“The stretch begins from the airport circle till Hanuman Camp. Currently, the students designing a show rack, which can be used at the gate of the temple. They have decorated the rack with teracotta tiles which can hold 60 pairs of shoes at a time,” Modi added.