Past. Present. Future. Between these, man is a restless creature. His worry about the coming future is understandable. But it is foolish on one hand to lament the past failures for which one is not responsible and on the other hand, becoming proud of one’s ancestral past without having any connection with it during the present.

One interesting aspect of modern man is his enthusiasm for facing the challenges of the future. He is gearing up every moment for coping up with his coming days. He invests his time and money in the womb of today so that offspring of future is healthy and self-confident.

But the sad part is that most of such investments are in pure material means. There are hardly a few, as little as a drop of a dew, who direct their energy for training the present so the future is tamed well.

And the few who do so are into it with their head and heart. With no proper sleep or rest, they devote their time with undying zest.

This was not the first visit of the writer to a children’s camp. However, there is a big difference between earlier experience of hosting a camp elsewhere and taking the role of a volunteer in such camps. The latter gives a better chance to interact with the little ones and thus ‘learn’ from them with outmost humility.

Although the assignment as a volunteer revolved around guiding and controlling the children in their effective training sessions, it was the children who became the role models. It was an instance when the adults present started to mimic the ways of the children. The children remained in their own time. But the grown-ups were for some time pulled back to their own childhood days.

Camps give children a chance to realize the potential within them, seen from the eyes that is outside them. Leadership qualities are unearthed and different techniques of personality development are discussed. And the spirit of competition is aroused.

Most of all, the members are convinced of the significance of team work and pooling together intellectual resources.

However, I should say that there is nothing as finality when it comes to means. There may be several ways, perhaps better ways, to achieve the ends. Thus not all the techniques used are in my opinion the most apt.

In short, CIGI?s approach is two-fold: training the present generation to meet the academic challenges including career growth and to bind the same with affinity towards the community. Although a infant compared to other decades-old educational movement, CIGI has won the hearts of men from different walks of life. However, it is yet to spread at the grassroots level of the community which will be another challenge by itself.

At the end of the 4-day camp, two things impressed me the most. And I believe these two factors are sufficient to meet the above said challenge.

Both the impressions dawned upon me the last day and this changed my earlier perception of this academic movement.

On the concluding day, the illustrious director of CIGI, Dr. Abu Bakr, a former scientist with the Baba Atomic Research Center, India gave his final remarks on the event.

While congratulating the students for their success and exhibiting remarkable changes in their performance compared to what he had seen prior to the training session, the scientist, who proved to be a man with down to earth humility but above the sky in sincerity, told the audience that when the chief counselor was arranging the chairs in order subsequent to the training session so that the final ceremony could take place well, he did not find any child helping the counselor. He meant to say that the personality training isn?t cent per cent perfect without developing such modes of character.

The second impression was, to use a CIGI acronym, more to do with ?SIMP? than ?IMP?. The tireless presentations at top of the voice for hours and hours, are just the work of the body. Its roots lie elsewhere. It is pure dedication, without having any leisure vacation. And this comes from the heart. As a management guru said, logic makes you think, emotion makes you act.

Things are not just as they appear, sometimes even the bold ones do fear.

The body can go on and on, provided the soul with His worship is adorned. The spiritual workout is a must for the success of the rest.

Struck with these two impressions, four days of volunteering concluded. What I had in my hand was a wealth of experience, a sincere advice from its counselor, and some ecstatic poetic lines in Prophet’s praise