The peace marchers carried candles and marched in silence. The 6 miles walk through the heart of Pune’s bustling military cantonment area ended at Babsaheb Ambedkar Garden. Babasaheb Ambedkar, the father of the Indian Constitution belonged to the low caste Dalit Community.

He accepted the Buddhist religion and many Dalits followed in his footsteps. The culmination of the peace walk at the Babsaheb Ambedkar Udyan symbolized the show of solidarity of the
Indian people with the human rights movement in Burma. Pune has nearly 300 hundred students from Myanmar studying in various colleges. However not many participated in the rally for fear of victimization later.

At the garden passages from the Dhamapada were chanted followed by a 10 minutes meditation. These passage from the Dhamapada urges all humans to look at the cause of suffering and to understand that if we cannot be of help to other living beings then we should steer away from causing any harm to  any living creature either.
All peace Marchers (which included some little children) later prayed for world peace and rent the air with chants of “Sarvenu bavathi Shantihi” followed by  Sadhu Sadhu Sadhu (Translated into English means- May all be blessed with peace to which  all respond with Sadhu  which  means “So be it.”

HCDI will participate in the next meeting on 16 October at the Azam campus Pune organized by the organization for Secular values and will work for anti trafficking on the Myanmar border. It has been in touch with a Swiss group working in Kolkatta for combating drugs and human trafficking across Myanmar. Those interested in joining the Pune chapter of the Burmese struggle for human rights may write to: CAHR Department holisticchild@sify.com