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Telugu
Community Meeting on 9/16/2000
(Excerpts from Babu Rao Mandava's speech)
1. Thanks
to all the people attending this historic event for Telugu
community in Hudson Valley. Especially those who came from
out of this area. We are part of the bigger Indian community
or the Hindu Samaj. We are not trying to start a new organization
here today. But we want to invest and strengthen the fabric
of our Indian community as a whole.
2. Acknowledgements:
We have a great organization here already. The biggest achievements
of this Samaj are this temple and the community center thus
far. There are many people responsible for these achievements.
One of them and the most important one is Dr. Sunil Khurana
without whom we could not have been here today. He was able
to pull all the people together and motivate them and provide
leadership with passion and dedication. He continues to do
that and for this we are all very grateful. We are very thankful
to him and his wife Seema for their superb and selfless contributions.
There are several others, however. I will quickly mention
the names of the trustees in the past 5 to 6 years. We are
honored to have some of them here today. Ras Seth, Manmohan
Desai, Lakxman Parsar, Arvind Shah, Usha Mittal, Ashok Shah,
Sushumna Iruvanti, Padma Soma, Uma Satyendra, Vijay Desai,
Rohit Jani, and Vasanthi Mirchandani. One of our Telugu friends,
Satya Akella started this activity along with others many
years ago and put in relentless efforts in supporting this
organization. We wish him well in California and thank him
for his efforts in our Valley. I am sure that I did not cover
all the names. But we want to thank all of them from the bottom
of our hearts. There is one special person from our Telugu
community who participated and supported relentlessly and
represented all of us at Hindusamaj. This person is among
us today. That is Padma Soma. We are very proud of her for
her services and support to Hindu Samaj. We want to thank
her and her husband Soma immensely for their contributions.
There are several others like Madan Mohan Soma and Durga from
our Telugus who donated a sizable real estate property to
the Samaj and continue to provide support and help the Samaj
silently. Some others like Anuradha who produced and directed
today’s enjoyable events with the help of many are all big
assets for us. 3. Community: There are many others like that
among our community today. Dr. Sunil Khurana and Padma Soma
initiated this gathering today. They both felt that there
are so many Telugus here and that we need to encourage and
inspire them to come and participate in the events and contribute
to the management of this divine facility. I hope their wish
is fulfilled and that we meet the intended purpose.
4. Purpose:
We want to bring awareness of the temple and the Hindu Samaj.
Bring enthusiasm among us just to meet often and know each
other. Make friends, share knowledge and bring greater awareness
of our diverse culture. Create community activities such as
entertainment, educational, and other informative programs.
Select some representatives to represent us and participate
in the management and contribute our share, encourage the
use of temple facilities, and continue some of our traditions
from back home. This requires resources for the community,
continuous funds, and our commitment.
5. Campaign
and Fund drive: I urge everyone to be a member and enjoy the
discounts, tax advantage, personal pride for the family, and
participate in support and management of the Hindu Samaj.
We want to make this our prime choice for donation or charities.
It is so important to complete the inner sanctum of the temple,
make the place debt free, support its maintenance and our
reverend priest or priests in future. These are our short
term goals and immediate needs.
6. Rich
Community: If we look around we can figure out that we are
a rich community of diverse culture. We need and can afford
better facilities today and for our next generation. We want
to select some representatives and charge them with these
duties. Fortunately we have several volunteers. We all have
to help them and support them so they can lead us to better
future. These people are Padma Soma, Anuradha Chitta, Raj
Bikkani, Srinivas Katta, Ramarao Chatlapalli, Pandit Nelavalli,
Hanumantharao Nallamothu, Rammohan Munipalle, Madanmohan Soma,
Narasimham Talukuntla, and Sivasankara Reddy. We want them
to be our leaders. If any more people consider this position
of leadership and want to channel their energies, please see
Padma Soma. I would like to recognize one person who took
enormous initiative and administered and followed up the many
intricate details that went into organizing today’s function.
That is SitaRam Balusu . We want to thank him and congratulate
him and several other people who made this dream a successful
and an enjoyable event for all of us. I hope he will continue
supporting this group of the leaders. We have to move into
a better future from here in long term.
7. Future:
I would like our leaders consider two new goals for moving
our community to a higher and more matured level. We need
to prepare ourselves with a fund for helping the people among
our society who may be under distress and anguish. Health
and other ailments may drive any one of us into that state.
We need a mechanism in our community to respond well. One
mechanism is to have a fat bank account for this purpose at
the disposal of our trustees of Hindu Samaj. The second one
is to plan for a bigger and better cultural home for multi
purposes. One that we all can be proud of and one that can
be enjoyed by the next generation as well.
8. Behind
all the diversities in our cultures, we are one divine family.
We are a religion of tolerance without any problem in accepting
other faiths and various approaches of people. All religions
are based on faith in God and basic devotion. “Bhakti Yog”.
We do not condemn any one because they look different, belong
to different class, caste, or color. We love and cherish them
all. We want to be united and be part of the bigger Indian
group always through Hindu Samaj.
9. Thanks
to all the people who came and made this a true success beyond
our imagination. We want to request Dr Khurana to talk about
the future plans and the progress on the Temple and tell us
what we can do to speed up implementation of those plans.
Telugu
Sadassu Invitation Letter The activities of the Hindu Samaj
Temple have grown enormously in recent years. This Time of
expansion has also brought about an increase in the TELUGU
COMMUNITY within the Hindu Samaj Temple and we are sensitive
to the challenges of growth. It is important for all of us
to work closely with the communities we live in and try to
be an integral part of the community by participating in its
activities and work towards promoting a greater awareness
of our diverse culture. With this mission in view, the
Telugu-speaking members of the Hindu temple are appealing
to all "Pravaasandhras" in Mid Hudson Valley and the surrounding
areas to come forward, enroll as members and participate effectively
in all its religious and cultural programs. This temple
is built for all of us and it is up to us to reap the full
benefits of this august institution. Telugu is the second
largest spoken language in India and as such we make up the
second largest denomination of any Indian community. Our participation
and representation will greatly strengthen this community.
We know that there are great thinkers, writers, philosophers
and artists among us. Let us use these talents to develop
this temple, so we may enrich our lives and increase religious
and cultural awareness in our children.
Some
of the ideas under consideration are (of special interest
to Telugu people): Starting Telugu Classes
Celebrating some important Telugu functions like Ugadi and
Sankranti Telugu Music and dance ( Kuchipudi) performances
by well known artists.
Screening of Telugu movies
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