Report & Pics: Sunil Cornelio
for Daijiworld Media Network – Doha  

Doha, Mar 13: From time immemorial discussions and debates have been raging on about employer-employee relationship. A lot has been said and experimented upon on how an employer can take care of his employees. Building a one-to-one relationship is a daunting task and considered to be just impossible in the present environment of a fast moving, highly competitive industrial world.  

A distinct concept of employer and employee relationship was witnessed in the premises of Indian Cultural Centre, Ashoka Hall at Doha recently. It was the celebration of the first annual day of Indian Managed Startup Company at Qatar marked by entertainment programmes for its employees significant to the land of their origin.  

The events commenced with the recalling of an evergreen quote of Oscar Wilde's -  'Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.' This was made by the chief executive officer of the company attired in line with the dress code applicable to organization employees. He thanked the Sheikh Salman Ahmed Al Thani and friends who had helped him while setting-up the company.  

Hit songs from Hindi cinema of yesteryears along with the latest songs of Bollywood were performed by Pakistani brothers Jamshed and Jawed. Nostalgic memories were recalled by Aun through the Kannada songs of Annavaru Dr Rajkumar. A total interaction of audience was ensured by the couple Arun and Milan by singing a few hit songs from Tamil films. The non-stop 90 minutes of musical entertainment programme was compeered by Milan Arun, a Qatar-based versatile singer hailing originally  from coastal Karnataka.  

The music programme was followed by a two-hour duration Yakshagana 'Dhaksha Yajna' by the employees of Advanced Technical Services, which was the highlight of the event. The performance of Satyanarayana Hegde as Bhagavatha, Vijaya Kumar Rai Puttur in the role of Shiva and Prashant Shetty Agari as Daksha were at par with professional artistes. The role of Parvathi by Thularachandra Rai Kadaba was truly commendable.  

The Yakshagana presentation at Qatar was made possible through sincere efforts of 'Guru,' veteran Yakshagana artiste Balakrishna Shetty Mundaje who had come all the way from Karnataka and within a span of one month trained amateur artistes for the event. All the props and artifacts used on stage for Yakshagana were also designed and fabricated in-house by the employees of ATS here.  

The cultural event was organized by "Advance Technical Services", a contracting and trading company based here in Doha. Ravi Shetty, the managing director of ATS was the prime mover of this event. Incidentally this is for the first time a Yakshagana play was staged in this part of the Arab land.  

This cultural event is a beacon in an alien land for encouraging and sustaining traditional arts of motherland by a Indian managed corporate company. The programme was compered by Sunil Cornelio, while Anthony Sojan proposed the vote of thanks.