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The friendly debate continues…
“Don’t dwell on what went wrong. Instead, focus on what to do next. Spend your energies on moving forward toward finding the answer.” – Denis Waitley, Author and Motivational Speaker
On 11th of July 2021, “Debractor 2.0” the successor of the friendly debate “Debractor” was held with the collaborative effort of Rotaract Club of Alumni of University of Moratuwa, RID 3220 and Rotaract Club of Katmandu, RID 3292. It has been more than a year and a half since the COVID-19 global pandemic is challenging everyone’s life. And I should say, Rotaract service for the community has become significant than ever. Having more than one year of experience in providing Rotaract services during the pandemic, now it is time to recap and discuss whether the pandemic has hampered the Rotaract Service. Hence, the topic for the debate was,
“COVID-19 was/wasn’t a barrier to rendering Rotaract services”.
The event was held on 11th of July 2021 at 6.45 pm in Sri Lankan time/ 7.00 pm in Nepalese time via Zoom platform. More than 70 participants from different Rotaract clubs from Sri Lanka, Nepal, Kenya, Mexico, Indonesia, and India also witnessed this thought-provoking debate.
Introducing the Teams
The impartial moderator of the debate was Rtr. PP Abhijeet Venkatraman Balaji, RAC Coimbatore Millennium, District Trainer, RID 3201- India. Ten Rotaractors from the two clubs were split into two debating teams. Each team consisted of members from both clubs debating together to prove their point-of-view. The composition of the two teams was as follows,
| Team A (Covid 19 was a barrier to render Rotaract services) | Team B (Covid 19 wasn’t a barrier to render Rotaract services) |
| Rtr. Dulaj Dilshan | Rtr. Paveen Perera |
| Rtr. Akhila Seneviratne | Rtr. Chamal Kuruppu |
| Rtr. Sahan Wickramage | Rtr. Apar Wasti |
| Rtr. Aadhar Wasti | Rtr. Shrishav Adhikari |
| Rtr. Diwa Ghimire | Rtr. Bipin Wasti |
“What is the one thing you enjoyed during the Covid-19 period”
With the invitation of Rtr. Netra Ramtel, President of Rotaract Club of Kathmandu, event was started with the opening Speech of Rtr.Ronali, the chairperson of the Debractor 2.0 phase 1 in Rotaract Club of Alumni University of Moratuwa. Before the beginning of the debate, Rtr. PP Abhijeet (our impartial moderator) remembered last year’s memories from Debractor 1.0 and also encouraged the audience by asking “what is the one thing you enjoyed during the covid 19 period”. Regardless of the cons of this period, it is delightful to know that our Rotaractors were courageous enough to find a silver light.
Let the debate begin…
The debate consisted of three rounds enabling teams to discover and prove more ideas. The 1st round was named 90MM as every speaker was given a chance to shoot their ideas (Reminder: Still a friendly debate). And the 2nd round: Do Really, team members can question opponents (Reminder again: Things are heating up, yet a friendly debate). And 3rd round, Ding Dong where the audience can share their opinion of the debate topic.
The reality of virtual
Rtr. Paveen pointed out that Covid-19 was a barrier to public speaking with virtual speaking compared to physical meets. Rtr. Chamal explained how the barrier was overcome with a wise example,
“Think about the barrier you build upon the river and if the flow is really high it overcomes the barrier and you can’t see that barrier at all”.
Further, he pointed out that virtual meetings give the opportunity to people who cannot be there physically. Then, Rtr. Apar added that in virtual meetings, the participants are focused on the session.
Then Rtr. Diwa Ghimire from Team A contrasted his point by adding that compared to the physical sessions it is demanding to measure whether participants actually grasp the requirement and ideas. In addition, the organizing team cannot exactly understand how participants are impacted with the project”.
Community Service, or is it?
Rtr. Shrishav questioned Rtr. Aadhar on a point that he mentioned earlier, “Community service has become an awareness program avenue, rather than community service avenue”. He questioned, “Isn’t an awareness program part of community service? ”.
What do you think?
Conclusion
The moderator invited Rtr. Ajay from the audience to share their impressions and opinion of the debate. Rtr. Ajay emphasized that we should actually get a learning experience from the Covid explorer path of Rotaract which enables forming new ways for Rotaract to reach out to the community and discover paths of empowering the lives.
With a Thank-You speech by Rtr. Kavinda Senarathne, president of Rotaract Club of Alumni of University of Moratuwa, the Debractor 2.0 marked another eventful day in the Rotaract calendar by enlightening the path to serve better.
written by: Rtr. Geethika Sandamali
edited by: Rtr. Reshan Dissanayake
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