PNS|Vijayawada
Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has hailed yoga as one of India’s greatest contributions to the world and stressed the need to make it an essential part of everyone’s daily life. Speaking during a media interaction at Undavalli residence on Wednesday, he credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi for giving yoga global recognition and announced that Andhra Pradesh will host a grand celebration of International Yoga Day on June 21 in Visakhapatnam.
The State government has launched a month-long campaign titled YogAndhra-2025, which aims to promote yoga as a mass movement across Andhra Pradesh. The campaign began on Wednesday and will culminate in a mega event on June 21, where five lakh people are expected to perform yoga from RK Beach to Bhogapuram from 7 AM to 8 AM. The CM also launched the official YogAndhra website to support the initiative.
Chandrababu praised PM Modi’s efforts that led to the United Nations declaring June 21 as International Yoga Day in 2014, recognising yoga as a universal practice that transcends region, religion, and nationality. “In today’s fast-paced, tech-driven world, yoga is the only path to inner peace. It’s time we make yoga a daily habit, not just a symbolic practice,” he said.
Highlighting the scale of the campaign, the Chief Minister said the goal is to involve two crore people across the State and train at least 10 lakh individuals, issuing certificates for participation and completion. Special yoga training programmes will be conducted in cities, towns, and villages, with over 2,000 yoga instructors and school teachers to be trained in partnership with the Morarji Desai National Institute of Yoga.
Yoga awareness activities will also be organised at more than 100 tourism and spiritual sites, including Amaravati Buddha Stupa, Lepakshi, Gandikota, Araku, Lambasingi and the Akhanda Godavari region.
The CM announced that yoga would be integrated into school curricula, with students receiving one hour of daily yoga practice. Volunteers and participants who actively contribute to the campaign may get a chance to attend the Prime Minister’s event on June 21.
“We are not doing this for photos or publicity, this is a movement,” Chandrababu said, urging the media and public to support YogAndhra-2025 and spread awareness about yoga’s benefits.
