Dandi March II flagged off at San Diego, USA

[pflmedia]

Press Note

March 13th, 2011



San Diego, USA

At 8 am on March 12th, an interesting event took place at Martin Luther King Jr. Park at San Diego, USA. A 78-year old man, attired to be a lookalike of Mahatma Gandhi arrived. He was accompanied by 30 others, wearing T-shirts with Gandhi’s famous silhouette and the caption: Dandi March II – A 240 Mile Walk Against Corruption. After the rendition of Indian national anthem, some of the marchers, Srihari Atluri, Jawahar Kambhampati, Subhash Karri and Varma Dantuluri, who are People For Lok Satta (PFL) members walking the entire 240 miles, shared their inspiration. Sunil Kumar, editor of the Dainik Chattisgadh, has flown in from India, especially to cover the entire march. As the marchers made their way through the sunny streets of San Diego, a group visiting from Boston also joined them.

It should be noted that on March 12th, 1930, Mahatma Gandhi launched Dandi March and walked 240 miles (390 kilometers) to fight for Indian Independence. Now, on the same day, NRIs are launching Dandi March II to fight against corruption. Also, in support of this movement supported primarily by People For Lok Satta, several Indians and members of different organizations are walking in over 12 cities across India and over 20 cities outside India on March 26th, the final day.

Meanwhile, in India, a group of elderly citizens have set off to retrace Gandhiji’s steps along the original route of Dandi March, from the Sabarmati Ashram to coastal Dandi, Gujarat. Led by Rajkumar Singh, their plan is to reach Dandi on April 6th and make salt. Small sachets of this salt will be mailed to all MPs of India, so they could transform themselves as pure as the salt. At the same time, in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh, more than 100 people came together to pray for the success of Dandi March II being held in USA.

By the end of day 2, the participation was overwhelming with 80 people joining the walk. Dandi March II is well and truly underway for next 15 days and will end with a major event at San Francisco on March 26th. Detailed proceedings of the march are available at http://www.dandimarch2.org/


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PFL Media

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