AYUSH ministry launches app to help people locate yoga centres and instructors

Ahead of the International Yoga Day on June 21, the AYUSH ministry has launched a mobile application to enable people locate yoga events and centres providing training.

The users will also be able to look for certified yoga instructors, a senior AYUSH ministry official said.

According to him, 'yoga locator'- a map-based location app - will also enable yoga instructors to register themselves and reach out to a maximum number of people.

"People want to know where they can go for yoga training or to pursue a yoga course. This app 'yoga locator' will help them locate yoga centres as well as yoga instructors within the preferred radius of their vicinity. Their aim is to encourage and help more and more people to adopt yoga," the official said.

He said it will be a permanent app, which will give information about yoga activities happening in their vicinity throughout the year.

Unofficially, there are more than two lakh yoga instructors in the country and it will enable them to enrol themselves.

The International Yoga Day will be celebrated on June 21 across the globe and the AYUSH ministry has shortlisted five cities -- Delhi, Shimla, Mysore, Ahmedabad and Ranchi -- for holding the main function this year.

It will be the government's first mega public event after Narendra Modi became prime minister for a second term.

Names of the four cities have been sent to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) which will finalise the venue of the main function of the International Yoga Day to be held on June 21, official sources said.

In the lead-up to the event, a two-day yoga mahotsav is being organised in Delhi by the Morarji Desai National Institute of Yoga starting Saturday. It will be attended by about 10,000 people, including yoga teachers, professionals, enthusiasts among others.

"The aim is to build an atmosphere of yoga in the lead-up to the main event and sensitise the people about the June 21 function," the official said.

The United Nations declared June 21 as the International Day of Yoga in 2014 after Modi called for the day to be adopted as a global celebration of yoga, an ancient practice that began in India more than 5,000 years ago.

Last year, the main event of the International Day of Yoga was held at the ground of Forest Research Institute, Dehradun, in which Prime Minister Modi participated.

The first International Yoga Day celebration was organised at Rajpath in New Delhi on June 21, 2015, in which representatives of 191 countries took part. In 2016, the main function was held in Chandigarh and in 2017 it was held in Lucknow.