This lady from B'luru runs a mobile school that teaches shlokas to Gen Y

Have you spent your childhood sitting beside your parents or grandparents, listening to them recite shlokas with relative ease? Or do you belong to the generation that hasn't had the chance to listen to any of these verses? Well, they are believed to have the power to heal you, cure anxiety and depression, and make you a whole lot calmer, apparently. Sounds unbelievable, doesn’t it? Maybe you won’t find it as unbelievable once you meet Divyaa Doraiswamy, who runs Gurukulam — The Shloka Learning Centre in Bengaluru.

Wait, a shloka school! Is there really such a school that teaches you shlokas? First of all, it isn't a regular school, but a mobile one. Divyaa, who calls herself a shlokapreneur, caters to small groups of children or individuals, where she conducts shloka lessons. What began as just sessions of shloka recitation to a few children in her apartment building has now expanded to a crowd of 50 children, some of whom live abroad. Yup, it’s shloka class on Skype for them.

"It is proven that shlokas have the power to heal you and make you a happier and calmer person," says Divyaa, quoting from personal experience. An economist with a high-paying job in the US, Divyaa was hit by the blues following a bad divorce. Later, she relocated to Bengaluru. "Coming from a traditional TamBrahm family, I grew up listening to shloka chants. During my bad days, the same shlokas came to my rescue. I became a happier person," she says, telling us why she decided to pass on the key to happiness to the younger generation.

Kids as old as 16 and as young as two, who attend with their mothers, attend Divyaa’s classes at the Gurukulam.