MCA completes 10 spectacular years, announces Kala Puruskar to Meena Rebimbus

The 10th annual general body meeting of Mangalore Cultural Association (MCA), Doha-Qatar was held at the Al Andalus Hall Doha on Friday April 20 at 6:30 pm. The annual meeting commenced with the MCA theme song seeking God’s blessings on all the MCA members and their dedicated work towards their mother tongue, culture and the less fortunate brothers and sisters back home.

Della Rego greeted all members and gave out a beautiful explanation on all the activities of MCA for the past 10 years. She mentioned all the wow factors of MCA activities which has been the first of its kind in Qatar. President Veena Rebimbus Pais later escorted the advisory committee members Felix Lobo, Jerry Pinto and Wilfred Fernandes along with the vice-president Clement Saldanha, secretary Hema Fernandes and treasurer Jason Quadros to the dais.

Meena Rebimbus

Veena Pais greeted all the advisory members with flowers and addressed the gathering with a heart full of gratitude towards the advisory and executive committee members for their continued support and dedicated efforts to take the Association to this great height in 10 years. She mentioned that in a span of 10 years MCA has done things beyond imagination. For the past 10 years more than Rs 75 lac has been distributed to the less fortunate in our home town for orphanages, education and medical aid. She also mentioned that MCA has not deviated from its objective and this is the proof of the dedication of all the working committee for the past 10 years. Veena also presented the list of programs for this year.

• Konkani elocution competition on May 25 at ICC.
• GVOM-6 auditions on June 8 at ICC’s Ashoka Hall.
• Vocal voice workshop in August.
• MCA’s monti fest celebration on September 14 at ICC’s Ashoka Hall.
• GVOM semi-finals and MCA’s decennial celebration on September 21 (tentative)
• MCA picnic for members on November 16.

MCA secretary Hema Fernandes later read out the annual report with the full details of all the activities organized by MCA for the year 2017/18. Treasurer Jason Quadros read the finance report. Both the reports were well taken by the MCA members and accepted. All three advisory committee members spoke out their feelings and concern towards the Association. They all praised the efforts and the zeal of all the members towards achieving the goal for the Association. 
Felix Lobo, Jerry Pinto and Wilfred Fernandes gave different instances about the consequences of helping a needy and how much more one could do for the unfortunates in our society

Kala Puruskar-2018

Mangalore Cultural Association, Qatar announced that the MCA Kala Puruskar 2018 will be bestowed on ’Konkan Myna’ Meena Rebimbus for her tremendous contribution to the field of music. The Award consists of Rs 1,00,000, a shawl, citation and a memento which will be given during the GVOM-6 semi-finals and the decennial celebrations on September 28.

One of the MCA members Alphonse D’Silva’s Volume 2 of ’Tururu’ was released by the advisory members on this occasion.

A small cultural programme was then performed by the members.

’Amcho Gavn Canara’ song was sung by Wilson and Shalini Mendonca, Clement Fernandes, Kirthan Rodrigues, Naveen and Sunitha D’souza, Rony and Hema Fernades, Jane D’Souza, Veronica Baretto, Jason Dias, Arthur and Veena Pais.
Comedy skit was performed by Clement Fernandes and George Menezes. ’Maka Thuzo ugdas yeta’ was sung by Kirthan Rodrigues and Eva Wilma Pinto.

Sandeep Noronha performed a standup comedy. Little Waylon Mendonca gave an excellent rendition of the song ’Mamma saangh’ to everyone’s appreciation. Naveen D’souza, Wilson Mendonca, Jason Dias, Rony Fernandes and Kirthan Rodrigues sang ’Amchya kushicha ghara’ and entertained all.

The whole event was brilliantly compered by Della Rego and appreciated by all. She also conducted some brilliant games for all age groups.

Dinner was served for all. A total of 120 members were present for the AGBM. The programme concluded at 10 pm.

Mangalore Cultural Association conducts the first ever Konkani quiz competition in Qatar

Mangalore Cultural Association, Doha-Qatar, as part of its decennial celebration, hosted the first ever Konkani quiz show in Qatar recently. The quiz show was entitled InQuizitive. This initiative was received with great zeal and enthusiasm.

A few guidelines and rules for the quiz competition were announced along with the registrations. As it has always been the initiative of MCA to keep the Konkani language alive among the younger generation, one of the rules was to have at least one team member of the age category 10 to 18 years. Four teams came forward and registered themselves with competitive spirit.

The teams were:

Team Konkan Taran (Naveen D’Souza, Agnel Ullas D’Souza and Saloni Ritika Lobo)
Team Wakra (Eva Wilma Pinto, Kirthan Rodrigues and Elvin Joshua Pinto)
Team Konkan Stars (Sandeep Noronha, Jyothi D’Souza and Ashton D’Souza)
Team Teen Taran (Aloysious D’Souza, Freeda Lobo and Waylon Mendonca)

The evening began with MCA ’geeth’. Jovita Pereira D’Souza welcomed the audience, briefed the audiences of the rules of the quiz and introduced the teams. The order of the teams was decided by picking of lots. The quizmaster for the evening was Gladson Almeida. Gladson is an exceptional writer, orator, singer and a person with an ocean of knowledge. He has won several accolades in poem writing competitions, speech competitions and singing competitions.

The quiz was divided into four rounds namely general round, rapid fire round, audio – visual round and buzzer round. The teams performed remarkably well. There was a tie for the first position between Team Konkan Taran and Team Konkan Stars. A tie breaker buzzer question was thrown at the teams and Team Konkan Taran thus came to be as the winner.

Advisory members Felix Lobo and Wilfred Fernandes presented the winning team with a cash price. All the other teams were given cash price as an appreciation for their participation.

The quiz show was well appreciated and MCA was encouraged to have another quiz show in the near future.

Pics by Jerald