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From: lakshminarayan krishnaswamy (tngepl_at_hotmail.com)
Date: Fri Jul 14 2000 - 08:05:12 PDT
Dear Sriman T.A.Varadhan,
It is nice to note about the ongoing efforts to support some of the Divya
Desams. Please send me the address and contact no:of the trust you had
mentioned, so that I can forward my contributions in cash/kind to them.
I am also in total agreement with Sriman.Vishnu's respone to the above
posting that:
a) DDs need to be supported by the Hindu community in general.&
b) There are other Divya Desams which also need the community's support.
Can I place a few suggestions to the recommendations contained in your
posting:
1)As regards "conduit" for reaching money to India, instead of creating
fresh systems or form new trusts, can we not activate and support existing
setups like "SVSS" who already have a presence.May be SVSS will have to
"market" itself aggressively.
2)As regards "adopting" temples, while primafacie it is a good idea, the
problem could be that some of the not so well know DDs could get left out.
It would be better if funds are collected by one agency and equitably
distributed.
At this point I am tempted to once again draw the attention of all members
to my earlier postings on "Funding of Srivaishnava Causes". I feel that the
present arrangement being pursued may suffer from the following drawbacks:
1) It tends to be adhoc. I sincerely feel that we can achieve better results
by opting for a cohesive,focussed,well organised & planned programme of
action.
2) Under the present system of funding there are every chances that causes
about which we have not heard of may get left out. A broader and across the
board participation would ensure an equitable and need based distribution of
funds.
3) By broadbasing, undercurrents of Kalai affiliation,Acharya
affiliation,Place affiliation etc. can be evened out and a sense of fairness
for the cause can prevail.
4) By time and again referring to the same base of bhakthas, over a period
of time we may tend to develop "fatigue".It is high time that we started
looking at a broader base of bhakthas who may be interested in doing
kaikaryam.Can we not think of one bhakatha referring another bhaktha for the
cause?
5) All of us would have heard of the adage "it is better to teach a person
to fish than to give him a free fish for lunch". I am of the firm opinion
that we also need to look at options of "making money" for the cause.
The various srivaishnava causes crying out for our attention could fall
under the following categories,viz:
1) Support to Divya Desams & other abhimana sthalams.
2) Support to Scholars, & to others who support the siddhantam.
3) Support for the study of our Siddhantam, Support for publishing
Literature on our Siddhantam.
4) Support for charity to the needy and underprivileged who are not as
fortunate as us.
Some time back when I was in Thoopul, one of the bhattars commented "Swami
Desikan did Unchavrutthi during his life time. We are carrying on the lines
shown by him even today".What a sad reflection on us!
I would normally not have re-raised this subject, but for a feature in
yesterdays T.V regarding a small girl by name "Palak" & aged about 10. This
girl wanted to save a boy ( about the same age but from a poor family) with
a congenital heart problem. Since the operation cost was put at around
Rs.70,000/-, she gave a solo music performance to raise the required fund.
The surgeon on the seeing the girl's enthusiasm agreed to perform the
operation free of cost. Today Palak has created a trust with whatever money
she had collected and is going on giving performances to collect more money.
This has resulted in 6-7 more poor boys getting medical facility (for
cardiac problems) which they could otherwise not have imagined.Can we not
emulate Palak.
Adiyen
K.Lakshminarayan.
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