This is an exciting and quite a significant news story, on the President of Russia practicing Yoga. If the story is to be believed, Russians emulate their Presidents, and thus Yoga is likely to find a large number of followers in the former communist country. This will certainly be an important step towards creating a better world, with deeper personal and world-level harmony.
China is the last bastion to be (re)won!
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MOSCOW: The ancient Indian yoga once banished from the country by a Communist leader is all set to make a home in the Kremlin next month when the new Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who practises the art, takes over.
Prodded by his wife Svetlana, president-elect Medvedev had joined the thousands of Russians eager to learn the Indian art of yoga. He now takes pride in his ability to perform ‘shirshasana’, a headstand pose.
Former President Boris Yeltsin’s tennis revolution had resulted in the birth of a whole constellation of Russian superstars like Kurnikova and Sharapova.
His successor, a Judo black belt holder and mountain skier Vladimir Putin gave boost to oriental martial arts and mountain skiing in the country and if the trend continues, Russia will soon be standing on its head, Centre TV (CTV) said in its weekend analytical programme ‘Post Scriptum’. “And if this trend is to continue under Medvedev, Russia will soon have more yoga schools than India,” CTV observed. Last year in an interview to Itogi magazine Medvedev, the then first deputy PM looking after major social and health reforms had said: “Little by little, I’m mastering yoga.”
Yoga, he explained, helped him relax from the stress of work. “I can even stand on my head,” Medvedev told magazine Tainy Zvyozd (Secrets of the Stars) last month.