NASHIK: The beauty of a rose flower is in its inherent beauty. But you have to go to the flower to get its fragrance. The rose shows its beauty to the world not only in colour but also in variety, thus expressed Founder of Nashik Rose Society, Rameshwar Sarda, while encouraging the rose lovers with the poetic words ‘’Zindagi suhani jung hai… Use jari rakhiye’.
Rameshwar Sarda was speaking while chairing the award presentation ceremony of the annual national level online competition organised by the Nashik Rose Society, held at Nasikclub. Founder member of the society, Dr Vikas Mhaskar, jury Ravindra Bhide and senior guide Bhagwant Thipse and Rose Society President Dhananjay Gujarathi were present at the occasion.
Bhagwant Thipse, who has been making significant contribution in the production and development of roses for the last 50 years, was honoured with Jeevan Gaurav Puraskar (Lifetime Achievement Award) on behalf of Nashik Rose Society.
President Gujarathi narrated the history of the foundation of the Society. General Secretary Amita Patwardhan described the two-year history of the Society, which was established on February 20, 2020 and gave information about various events conducted online during the time of the pandemic.
In the first national level online rose competition, 876 entries were received in 2021. This year, the competition was conducted in two groups — Nashik and Bharat, from February 1 to Feb 5. In this year, 1400 entries were received. In the competition, photos of the roses on the tree and then kept in a bottle apart from videos of the flower from 360 degrees were examined from various angles.
The winners of this national competition were selected through a very tough test. The outstation winners were honoured online while the winners from Nashik were honoured by the guests. Manjusha Bhagdane, Nilima Chaudhary, Pallavi Drakshe, Mangesh Patil, Shubham Jadhav were also honoured by the guests for uploading the available entries.
The programme was moderated by Prerna Kulkarni, while the introductory speech was delivered by Amita Patwardhan. The guests were introduced by Swati Titkule. Kritika Ghia proposed the vote of thanks. Flower decoration in the hall was done by Meghna Mhaskar and Ragini Kakkar.
“From childhood, the love of roses took root in the mind through the mother and continued to flourish with the help of a wife. Today, the biggest reward in the 50-year journey of love for the rose has been received. I consider this award to be bigger than the Padma award. Satisfaction of being blessed while receiving the honour.”- Bhagwant Thipse, Awardee
“One gets a lot of knowledge from any competition. It is more important than getting an award. This requires participating in competitions as well as working non-stop.Nashik Rose Society needs to make efforts for organisational expansion. Monthly competitions, connecting rose lovers through magazines, Fellowships should be started along with a library to increase the knowledge about roses.” – Dr. Vikas Mhaskar, Senior Advisor
Winners honoured
Winners from Nashik include Umakant Pawar, Dhanshree Kulkarni and Anay Saraf.
Consolation prizes: Rupal Devghare, Priyanka Ubalekar, Paresh Narkhede, Poonam Gund, Aniket Kanhore, Arjun Chavan, Manjiri Baste, Sujata Kapure and Swati Patil.
Awards presented at national level
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‘King Gulab’ Award: Prashant Telang
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‘Queen Gulab’ Award: Pradip Sarkar
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‘Prince Gulab’ Award: Hitesh Shah and
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‘Princess Gulab’ Award: Pradip Kumar Banerjee.
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Hybridizer category: Girija Vira Raghavan, Subrata Ghosh, N B Shastri, Pranbir Maiti and Ashok Mait.
