NEW DELHI: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is gearing up to celebrate International Yoga Day on June 21 in the heart of Riyadh city. The Indian diplomatic mission in Saudi Arabia has promoted and organised several yoga (considered as a sport in the country) at camps, schools and colleges as part of Quality of Life and health programming under Vision 2030.
“On June 16, the Indian community in Saudi Arabia celebrated yoga under ‘Disha Yoga Meet’ at Real Madrid Stadium in Riyadh. More than 2,000 yoga enthusiasts joined the event which was attended by diplomats from other missions and also by Saudi Arabian Yoga instructor and Padma Awardee, Nouf Marwaai who is also the President of the Saudi Yoga committee,” Indian Ambassador to KSA, Dr Suhel Ajaz Khan told this paper adding that similar events were organised by Disha at Jeddah and Dammam which saw the participation of 1,000 yoga enthusiasts.
There are many other cities across KSA that are celebrating Yoga Day including Al Jubail, Al Madinah, Al Munawawarah, Macce, Taif, Al Bahah, Abha, Riyadh, Dammam, Jeddah and Najran. Nouf Marwaai was awarded India’s fourth largest civilian award the Padma Shri in 2018. She is the founder of Arab Yoga Foundation in KSA which has taught Yoga to over 10,000 people and trained over 700 people to teach yoga.
“I would like to thank the leadership of Saudi Arabia for embracing yoga and permitting it to be practised all across the Kingdom,” the Ambassador said. It was only in 2017 that Saudi was formally and officially introduced to yoga, back then it was taking baby steps to the practice through virtual introductory lessons.
Six years and countless initiatives later, Saudi Arabia’s national team is a part of their first-ever international contest at Mt. Everest International Yoga Championship that was held in Kathmandu, Nepal from June 8-10. What would have seemed like a distant dream in KSA a few years ago, has become a reality now as more and more people are practising yoga, said the Indian envoy.
