The movie that started the movement

An international peace initiative triggered off by a film made by Canadian film-maker, Mitra Sen recently reached Indian shores. With a stamp of approval by the mayors of various cities from Canada and United States, The Worldkids Foundation brought the Peace Tree movement to India for the first time. 

While the film titled The Peace Tree was shown on a public platform for the first time in the country at NCPA, Toronto based filmmaker, Mitra Sen also trekked back to her home country to encourage the movement apart from finding fodder for her next big screen endeavour.

Sen who also works as a school teacher in Toronto shaped the movie out of her personal experiences. She says, “I was trying to encourage my students to understand festivals from other communities when one of them objected to it and said she wasn’t interested to learn about other religious faiths.”

The movement in the West earned full political support, with Sen explaining, “Being a multicultural city, the mayor of Toronto was very happy to stamp his approval to the movement in raising awareness among kids about learning more about foreign faiths.

Educational institutions across the globe have got involved in the programme. Sen recounts, “While the mayor in Los Angeles initiated the movement there, I had a nine-year-old kid come and ask me if she could start the initiative in her school. Since then, the movement has been practiced in several schools across the world.” 

In Mumbai, schools like Cathedral and John Cannon School have already embraced the movement and were also involved in constructing actual peace trees in the NCPA premises. 

Interestingly, we caught up with Sen when she was in India a while ago to search for more material for her next movie titled Under The Same Sun that will dwell on the relationships between the Hindu and Muslim communities. Sen says, “We have completed one leg of shoot at Rajasthan and are on the lookout for more inputs for the film.”