01
1 October 2026
The championship opens
On 1 October 2026 the championship opened at Bharat Sevashram Sangha in Muluk, Bolpur, Birbhum.
The association had asked colleges and universities in West Bengal for a ground. None offered one. Bharat Sevashram Sangha took the meet in, through the interest of Swami Shanti Maharaj. The chair asked whoever led the association afterwards not to leave the Sangha. He said the association was joined to the national federation of the Government of India, and that the other yoga organisations in West Bengal were not. Those were his words from the opening. The championship banner names Yogasana Bharat and World Yogasana. He also said the association’s own programmes were already running somewhere in Bengal every day, and on some days in three or four places.
Sourabh J. Sarkar was introduced as Mahacharya, and as State President of Bharatiya Krishak Samaj in West Bengal. The chair said he was an IIT student, and spoke of science in the farming of the Gangetic plain. He recalled Vivekananda’s line that one who would be a king must first learn to be a subject.
The chair said the previous year’s state championship had drawn about three hundred athletes, and that this year, even after he asked the districts to send no more, the gathering had passed six hundred. Those were his words from the opening. Rooms and meals at the ashram were already stretched. Standing in Birbhum, he said an opening could not leave Rabindranath aside. He introduced Kalyan Mukhopadhyay, a retired IPS officer who had long handled the West Bengal police.
A woman who had arranged district judging from home was thanked. She said the women with her were homemakers, learning the work as they were asked to do it. A Vedic invocation was then chanted in the hall.
Swami Shanti Maharaj welcomed the districts, and offered respect to the district and state office-bearers who had come. He noted that the lodging was imperfect, and recalled Swami Paramananda’s point that a seeker’s practice does not run on comfort. He called the ashram a place of practice, and returned the word yoga to yuj: to join, and to bring the mind under control.
A rhythmic, artistic presentation followed in the hall. The chair thanked the dancers for that artistic and rhythmic work. He then spoke of the Sangha as he had first heard of it: monks who travel, receive what people give, and return to serve.
Kalyan Mukhopadhyay said a yogasana is complete only when the body, the mind, and one’s bearing are all held. He described police standing from ten in the morning until three in the afternoon in the heat, still expected to stay restrained when the crowd arrives, and said that control is what the police need at every hour. He asked people in Yogasana to work with the police, and to teach them to be calmer, and still firm, so that a different future could be made.
Supriyo Mukherjee, asked to help the meet be seen, said media had taken kabaddi from a village game with no standing to a paid public sport, in which, he said, a player could earn two or three crore in a season. He would look at what might be done for competitive Yogasana, and he set Baba Ramdev’s work as a different level from a competition. He also said he had not known of West Bengal’s results in the sport until that day. He announced no result of this meet.
Rina-ji said practice has to continue, whether or not anyone wins. Major Saheb quoted Rabindranath: “বিশ্ব সাথে যেথায় তুমি বিহারো.” He named the four paths Vivekananda speaks of — raja, jnana, karma, and bhakti — and asked that yoga be of the mind as well as the body. He left one line in English: “I for Illness, We for Wellness.” He closed with the peace chant. The thanks then turned to Papiya Bhattacharya (Roy), General Secretary.
From that opening, the championship moved into its working days.
The championship enters its rhythm
