<i>A day steeped in magic</i>

Volunteers for Bangladesh (VBD), a wing of Jaago Foundation, celebrated Universal Children's Day (UCD) through a grand event named "UCD 2011" campaign across the country yesterday.
Clad in yellow T-shirts, around 7,000 VBD volunteers, all students of different English and Bangla medium schools, colleges, and universities, stepped into the shoes of street children for a day to create awareness about child rights.
The event was supported by the US Embassy, Dhaka; Airtel; Pizza Hut; KFC; Far East Knitting & Dyeing Ltd; Austan; Pepsi; Wonderland; Green World; Prescription Point; TTL; Kaharba Productions; Elite Force; Evatix; and Carpet Bag.
Jaago Foundation, a youth based organisation geared to offering a positive and brighter future to the children of slums, has been organising the event for the last three years to raise awareness about the UCD.
At the event, which started at 8:00am, the volunteers sold flowers and other items to people at the busiest traffic points in 10 districts of the country and talked to the people about the importance of the day.
Additionally, the underprivileged children of the locality were taken to well-known locations to spend a day having fun and nutritious food.
In Dhaka, around 3,000 volunteers spent the entire day at 20 traffic points while the disadvantaged kids were taken to Wonderland where they enjoyed free rides, games and magic show.
Important personalities, notably Lauren Lovelace, director of The American Centre; Anisul Huq, former president of Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FBCCI); Akku Chowdhury, executive director of Transcom Foods Ltd; Abhay Seth, head of Sales and Marketing of Airtel Bangladesh; and Nazim Farhan Choudhury, managing director of Adcomm Ltd, were present.
Apart from Dhaka, the districts participating in the event are Chittagong, Sylhet, Rajshahi, Barisal, Feni, Gazipur, Narayanganj, Khulna and Rangpur.
The money being collected from the volunteers' sales in Dhaka will be used to help Jaago Foundation provide education to under-privileged children in Dhaka.
The money raised in each district will go towards funding community development projects planned and executed by local youth groups of VBD, says a press release.