World Yoga Day: Truck Aasana campaign aims to help long-distance drivers race to fitness

The Zee Media campaign seeks to help long-distance truck drivers, who often have complains of body ache and soreness, discover fitness through a series of special Yoga aasans.

New Delhi: They drive trucks through some of the toughest terrains in the country and often without a break for several hours. Little wonder then that while truck drivers play a critical role in keeping the economy running smooth, they often do it at the cost of their own health.

Driving on highways through the day and often all through night is a daunting challenge. Delivering goods from one part of the country to another - through sunshine, rain and storms, truck drivers are often the unsung heroes behind a flourishing economy. That it comes at the cost of their own health is not highlighted enough and that is exactly what Zee Media - in association with Castrol - put the focus on recently when a number of these drivers in Himachal Pradesh's Baddi were taught exercises as part of Truck Aasana, a Yoga Day initiative.

Many participants said that they regularly face back pains, ache in joints and eye strain. Time to workout is a luxury these drivers just don't have and therefore, incorporating these exercises into their daily routine was a big challenge.

Some of the major complaints of most truck drivers were found to be:

* Lack of sleep

* High stress levels

* Back pain

* Neck pain

* Pain in the joints, especially in the knees

* Eye strain

* Mental fatigue

To meet with these challenges and yet not compromise on the working schedules of truck drivers, Neelam Vaswani of the Yoga Institute of Mumbai, came up with a number of simple yet effective aasans. Exercises with catchy names like 'Accelerator aasan' and 'Coolant aasan' were taught to the participants, helping them relax their bodies and strains in various places like back, shoulders, neck, knees and feet.

Only a few minutes of these exercises each day can go a long way in helping truck drivers remain fit despite the herculean task they undertake on a daily basis.