Recreational academy promoting the sport to build mental and physical capacity

NARDA Mohamed Mangra is a community activist at heart, but she has many interests and simply cannot stay still for long. As such, she is doing many things to boost the capacity of herself and others through her established organisations.

She is the mother of one, and has been an employee attached to the High Commission of India in the Commercial/Political Section for the past eight years.

Mohamed Mangra is responsible for allocating scholarships to Guyanese to study in India in the exchange programme between the two countries.

The 38-year-old is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of the National Academy of Recreational and Developmental Arts (NARDA), which was established in November 2022.

The non-profit organisation offers out-of-classroom courses to build mental and physical capacity such as archery.

Mohamed Mangra is a certified Archery Level Two Instructor/Coach, and is one of 25 influential women leaders in Guyana “Women in Business”.

“Although I did accomplish a lot academically and generally, I felt an emptiness, and I knew I have the ability to learn quickly and I applied myself because I wanted to do more to assist others. So, during COVID-19 when I got married, my husband, Anand Mangra, is a World Archery Coach. We embarked on an archery journey together. We certified ourselves overseas and came back to teach others locally. At that time, I was studying at the University of Guyana (UG), and when the Eccles Policing Group (CPG) asked us to help with a recreational programme, we introduced archery. It started with two persons, and today we have trained more than 1,500 individuals collectively,” she said.

Mohamed Mangra told the Pepperpot Magazine that she also did a bit of everything arts, such as dancing, drama, modelling, cooking via Carnegie Home of Economics and also sang.

She found her niche when she established Pro Archers Club Guyana and NARDA, an institute geared towards uplifting people via recreational development to teach art.

Mohamed Mangra reported that NARDA offers physical/mental training and is a unique recreational academy. The academy promotes overall health, fitness and well-being through physical training and mental coaching. She stated that they aim to incorporate healthy recreational practices in order to lead people to become independent. They also offer free coaching but do ask for a contribution which goes towards the equipment.

She noted that the motto of NARDA is “Healthy body, wealthy minds” and they practice what they preach and it works since archery is a simple sport that require special skills set.

She related that for academic classes, they have time and money management and public speaking. For physical training, they offer archery, darts, chess, axe throwing and others and for mental health coaching, they have motivational sessions, one-on-one coaching and emotional healing.

Mohamed Mangra also formed the Pro Archers Guyana, which is based in Eccles, East Bank Demerara and offers pocket-friendly archery training.

Apart from promoting archery in Guyana, Mohamed is a volunteer with several NGOs and is usually the Grammar teacher in the capacity-building programme for the children in Tiger Bay.

Mohamed Mangra is also a member of the Eccles Community Policing Group (CPG). She is a Government of Guyana scholarship recipient who recently graduated from the West Indies University in Barbados with a Masters of Business Administration.

She is the youngest of five siblings and practically grew up in the shadows of her sister, Nadia, who is a social activist. She wanted to become just like her.

Recalling her younger days, Mohamed Mangra told the Pepperpot Magazine that she used to go with her sister to these countryside villages where she taught the girls how to wrap saris, dance and did many forms of drama.

Mohamed Mangra reported that her siblings were instrumental in forgotten traditions and love working with young people and children.

Growing up, she admired the work her sister did behind the scenes and patterned herself like her and today, she is glad she did because it moulded her into a grounded person who knew what she wanted and went after it.

Mohamed Mangra is also a volunteer in the mandirs and mosques and in community-based development. She is an ambassador of peace under the Universal Peace Federation and has her hands filled as is.