It’s been a historic visit by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to UK and Maher Community has been proud to be a part of this history.

Maher Raas Group, lead by Rambhai Modhvadia met with PM Narendra Modi, UK PM David Cameron and his wife.

Maher Raas Group performed the world famous Maher Traditional Dandia Raas in front of packed Wembley Stadium.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has hailed his country’s “special relationship” with the UK as he addressed a Wembley Stadium rally.
Speaking at an event marking the Indian diaspora’s contribution to the UK, he said it was “a historic day for a great partnership between two great nations”.
He had been greeted by huge cheers from the 60,000-strong crowd as he arrived on stage with UK PM David Cameron.
Earlier, Mr Modi had lunch with the Queen at Buckingham Palace.
His three-day visit was the first to the UK by an Indian PM in a decade.

Watch entire ceremony here

Learning to be a Winner….

The day of Sunday 9^thSeptember 2015 was a very beautiful autumn day in England and it will be remembered forever by the Maher Girls Raas group living in Leicester. We had entered the 38th annual Gujarati Hindu Association Raas Garba competition. The Maher Girls group won the 1^st prize for the Senior Raas; the 1^stprize for senior costumes; and the 2^nd prize for Junior Garba.

Winning the competition was not an easy task and as with all journeys to success ours too was presented with many hurdles. The preparations for this journey ending in a Win had begun Six weeks earlier. As part of the preparations, we had to train new group members, choreograph the Raas, organise the costumes for both groups and select the music for competition performances. Added complication to this was the fact that it was English summer-time and many of the members of the group were away on holidays and therefore we were not able to practice regularly as a whole group.

With just over two weeks left before the competition, we began putting together Raas for Senior Group. With the rough cut of the music, started adding steps to the lyrics and within two days Raas was complete. The remaining time was spent perfecting each step and transition. While putting together the Raas, aim was to keep traditional steps intact and at the same time, enact the lyrics through our steps. This Raas for the competition was completely different to any we have done in the past and therefore, it was that extra bit special.

At the same time, our Junior Group was spending practice time perfecting their steps, to a traditional Mehrani Rasro, which I believe is regularly performed by Maher women living in villages. Being one of our characteristic community dance, we had decided to use is for junior girls Garbo. Some of the girls were as young as seven years old and amazingly had picked up the steps within such a short period of time. One of the main aims of the Maher Raas Group was to showcase Maher Culture and Heritage, through this competition entry; and therefore a main purpose for using a Rasro for the junior group.

Winning the competition is a true testimony to the hard work, commitment and energy of the girls. This Win wouldn’t have been possible without each and every single girl displaying endearing enthusiasm and selfless service to group performance.

The help, support and good wishes of the parents, relatives as well as well-wishers had allowed us to triumph and overcome every hurdle that had to be negotiated.  We would like to thank the parents of all the Girls in the Maher Raas Group for their continuous support throughout the years and specially leading up to the competition. Some special thanks go to Santokben Odedra and Hiraben Modhwadia who had transformed my rough sketch into a prize winning costume for the senior group.

We, being the Maher Raas Group girls, pray that good wishes will continue to reach us and blessing from all our supporters will continue to motivate us for even better innovative dance performances in the future.

As with all events in life, this competition and wins for both groups will soon turn into a distant past memory. However, the friendships developed between the girls and families who participated in the event will continue to prosper for a long time to come and whenever they meet they will continue to remind each other how beautifully they had worked together before and during the competition.

From a personal point of view, preparing for the competition presented me with an opportunity to improve my cultural and social understanding of the Maher community and learn about the character of the all diligent Mahers. Today I can proudly say that this character is made up of Humility, Excellence, Kindness, Courage, Action and Wisdom and there is no doubt these qualities will inspire us to leave a lasting legacy for future generations. In short, having done all this I feel mentally and morally a richer Mehrani.

I look forward to continuing to serve the Maher community by helping the girls to enrich their lives, put smiles on their loved ones faces and earn good wishes of Mahers at large. 

Jai Lirbai Maa

by Krishma Dhirubhai Modhvadia (Leicester, UK)