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A monthly communiqué
November 2020 No. 11
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EDITOR'S NOTE
We hope that you had a wonderful and safe Diwali and Thanksgiving! While this year's holidays aren't exactly the way we all want them to be, we have been doing our best to make the most of this time. With the positive news of multiple vaccines faring well in their Phase-3 trials, we look up to a better 2021.
The IAGB By-Laws are now updated and we are getting ready for the annual General Body Meeting, which will be held on December 5th from 1 to 3 pm. It will be a virtual event, for members only. Scroll down for further details of the meeting.
As our IAGB Youth wing is taking shape and gaining steam, we are very excited to launch the IAGB Youth Editorial section in the monthly newsletter. Please welcome our youth editorial director Aarushi Pant.
We would like to give a heartfelt thanks to our generous community who donated and made our “Thanksgiving Food Drive” a huge success! We were able to make 52 Thanksgiving dinner baskets for 52 families, which were delivered to the Merrimack Valley Food Bank, Inc. A special shout-out to our IAGB Director Jeyanthi Ghatraju and team who worked tirelessly and raised double the number of baskets that we had aimed for!
The IAGB EC is getting very busy preparing for the upcoming Republic Day 2021 event. Stay tuned as we start announcing details in the coming days. We look forward to your participation and support.
In this issue, you will find:
- From the Director's corner - Sanjay Kudrimoti
- Guest Column - The Evolution of Locations in Bollywood - Anish Desai
- IAGB Spotlight on New England Kannada Koota (NEKK) - Yogita Miharia
- IAGB Youth Corner - Aarushi Pant
- IAGB Youth of the month
- IAGB Youth Art & Music Spotlight
- IAGB Upcoming events
- IAGB General Body Meeting registration
- IAGB Republic Day 2021
- IAGB Cares - Holiday Food Drive
- IAGB in the News
- IAGB Community Partnerships
- IAGB Sponsors
- Our Media Partners
STAY HOME STAY SAFE!!!
IAGB continues to encourage all members and their family and friends to maintain social distancing and follow all CDC guidelines with respect to gatherings and social events. As the temperatures drop and holiday season goes in full swing, please be aware of cases surging locally and nationally. We have to do our best to contain and minimize the spread of virus.
Please reach out to us at iagb@iagb.org if you need assistance of any sort in these difficult times.
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FROM THE Director's Corner
--Sanjay Kudrimoti
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Public service is innate to Indian American culture. Most Indian Americans are active in public service via their community service and through active participation in various nonprofit and charity organizations. Probably the most prominent way until date Indian Americans have contributed is via their skills. Indian Americans have been fore-bearers of innovation in the fields of health care, technology and education. Hence a natural progression can be seen now in the landscape of the elected body.
Governance in America is primarily bottoms-up. The real day to day issues regarding public concerns are addressed and handled at the local level. In the recent 2020 elections there were 35 separate ballots that featured an Indian name...
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GUEST COLUMN
--Anish Desai
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If any of you have been long-time Bollywood fans like I have been, I am sure you have noticed the evolution of locations in Hindi movies over the last several decades.
I started watching movies as a very young kid in the late seventies and eighties and made it a point to catch up on some of the older ones on our Sony Betamax VCR as well. My memories of the fun movies from the 60s are of a dashing Shammi Kapoor going to hilly locales in India like Kashmir, Shimla, Mussoorie and Nainital, where he would woo a young pretty heroine like Saira Banu, Sharmila Tagore or Kalpana, partake in some melodious songs until the interval at which point a Pran or Premnath would make his entry to make things interesting and then all would be well at the end. So Indian “hill stations” were the go-to places...
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-- Yogita Miharia
eNews edition shines SPOTLIGHT on an individual (or a team) who has (have) a positive and significant impact on the lives of New England residents and on community organizations.
IAGB is proud to spotlight New England Kannada Koota (NEKK) for the November eNews edition. The current Executive Committee of NEKK is an all women's team.
Yogita Miharia of IAGB met with the NEKK Secretary Mamta Kudlugi and had a wonderful heart to heart, woman to woman chat.
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Yogita: Thank you Mamta for taking the time to talk to IAGB. First of all, I would like to tell our readers about your all-women’s Executive Committee! How cool is that!! How did it happen?
Mamta: It happened very organically. Couple of us who were going to run for various positions asked other women members and we all just came together to form the Executive Committee. It was so exciting and amazing when that actually happened. We have had a lot of women on the committee before, including women presidents, but this is the first time it is an all-women’s team.
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Introducing IAGB's Youth Committee
-- Supriya Shekar
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This is Supriya Shekar, Director of IAGB and IAGB Youth Initiative. I joined IAGB in October 2019 with a goal of bringing awareness about our platform to youth, and to provide them resources and skills that can be easily applied in their future endeavors.
Sanjay Gowda, our President of IAGB, has been paving the way for the youth community for many many years now. One such program is Youth Excellence Awards. This program every year puts forward 10-20 young talented students across the New England area. We decided to build a leadership team from these applicants, who can help us bring this initiative to reality. Our goal was to create programs that will benefit young kids and adults in the community by participating and attending events and activities hosted by these young leaders.
IAGB Youth will be an initiative for youth to connect, socialize and interact with other youth in the New England area and share thoughts, ideas, challenges and solutions to create a more inclusive community for all. More importantly a platform for us adults too, to learn and understand the youth perspective on current affairs, culture, and traditions , so that we pave the path for the future that they want to live in.
This IAGB Youth group comprises youth volunteers- run by the youth group, for the youth in the community. This team is an extension of IAGB Executive team, and will work closely with the IAGB Youth & Next Gen initiative.
We would love to announce IAGB Youth board members for 2020-2021 , please welcome them on board and support these young leaders who will bring programs and community services that they have designed and lined up themselves.
IAGB YOUTH TEAM 2020-2021
President - CYNTHIA RAJ
Vice President- ADWAY WADEKAR
Director of Editorial- AARUSHI PANT
Director of Art and Music- RUHI SHROFF
Director of Community Service- NITHYA RAJ
Directors of Youth talks- NIPUN GOEL, SHOURYA GUPTA , SERENA CHAND
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A note from IAGB Youth Editorial Director
-- Aarushi Pant
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We have just witnessed history with a record number of Americans voting in the 2020 US Presidential elections. After a close race in which youth votes played a pivotal role, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr is now President-elect of the United States. On November 7th, as the whole country closely followed the election map for signs of major developments, the state of Pennsylvania was declared and the vote was decided. Kamala Devi Harris, the Vice President-elect, represents significant advancements for the Indian American community, the African American community, and all women as she takes the reins of the highest office reached by an American woman. We look forward to investments of billions of dollars towards science and technology research, widespread efforts for global health security, and a strong focus on environmental and climate issues. The new administration pledges to move toward a “100% clean energy economy,” with net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, furthering our country’s contributions to the fight against global warming and ocean acidification. In terms of the COVID-19 pandemic, there holds a promise to see massive economic measures taken to aid families and small businesses as well as increased funding for vaccine research and treatments for the virus. The era of hope reigns high as democracy prevails.
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IAGB Youth of the Month
Anoushka Mallik
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Anoushka Mallik, a Brookline High School senior, is dedicated to public service. Since July, Anoushka has worked closely with the Biden Campaign in Pennsylvania, making hundreds of calls and leading numerous trainings in Delaware County, one of the five main counties that turned Pennsylvania blue in the election. Since her junior year, she has had a paid internship with the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center (BARCC). During this internship, she developed a curriculum to educate high schoolers on consent and identifying risky situations. She is now trained in leading conversations about healthy relationships and sexual violence prevention. From 2015 to 2018, Anoushka attended four service trips to Mexico, each year building a home for a family in need. Since the beginning of the pandemic, Anoushka has spent five hours each week volunteering with the Brookline Food Pantry. She is currently the News Managing Editor of her high school’s student-run newspaper, which has won a commendation for excellence from the New England Scholastic Press Association. IAGB congratulates Anoushka Mallik on being the November 2020 Youth of the Month.
~ IAGB Youth Editorial Director, Aarushi Pant
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IAGB Youth Art & Music Spotlight
on
Amrita Thirumalai
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Amrita Thirumalai, a high school senior at the Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science, has learned Bharatanatyam from Guru Sridevi Ajai Thirumalai and Carnatic music from Guru Tara Anand since the age of five. Having completed her arangetrams, she teaches both art forms to junior students over Zoom. Over the years, Amrita has won many prestigious solo and group competitions in both dance and music, and she performs regularly to raise funds for the nonprofit organization Akshaya Patra. She says, “Art is my happy place. Especially now, with the ongoing pandemic and changing world, it has been a constant, welcoming me with open arms.”
~ IAGB Youth Editorial Director, Aarushi Pant
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The IAGB YOUTH team kicked off their first event - Youth Talk series for the topic “Youth perspective on Election 2020 “. The knowledge, confidence, perspective and presentation by these young leaders is mind-blowing.
If you missed the event, here is the link to the full video where you can watch these young 16 year olds give their perspective on Election 2020 in this virtual talk.
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IAGB Upcoming Events
- IAGB General Body Meeting - November 2020
- IAGB Republic Day - January 2021
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IAGB General Body Meeting (GBM)
In accordance with the IAGB by-laws (available for review on the IAGB website), we will be holding an Annual General Body Meeting (GBM) on December 5, 2020, from 1 to 3 pm, and it will be a virtual event given the current circumstances.
It is member only event and all valid members are invited to attend the GBM. In order to help us plan appropriately, we kindly request you to register to attend, and please click here to register. The Zoom meeting information will be sent to valid members who registered to attend.
Date : December 5, 2020
Time: 1 to 3pm ET
Agenda:
- Overview of the prior year and accomplishments
- Financial overview
- Upcoming activities
- Amendments to the Bylaws
- Q&A
Amendments to the Bylaws/Constitution:
To keep up with the current times, there are some amendments proposed to the IAGB Bylaws, which have been approved by the majority of the EC. Please click here to access the Bylaws with proposed amendments. The proposed changes are highlighted and appropriate comments are added to make it easier to read in the context of the changes. If you have any questions or feedback on the proposed changes, please email to iagb@iagb.org, by November 30th. Per the IAGB Constitution, amendments must be approved by a vote of at least two-thirds of the members present at the annual General Body Meeting (GBM).
If you have any questions, please reach out to us at iagb@iagb.org.
We hope to see you at the General Body Meeting.
Sincerely,
IAGB EC 2019-2021
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IAGB Republic Day 2021
Save the date Jan 30th 2021 for the grand finale. There will be a series of events leading to the big one, so stay tuned for details.
Get to know more about Republic Day IAGB Marketplace, Registering for RD Digital Magazine or Sponsorship for IAGB RD event on https://iagb.org/sponsorship
IAGB strives to be a unifying community organization across New England. Advertising with us lets you communicate with the broader Indian-American community and provide IAGB with funds to successfully host events for the benefit of the community. Please consider sponsoring for Republic Day 2021. Here are various and flexible options to sponsor and support Republic Day celebrations.
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RD2021 Digital Magazine Ads and Virtual Expo
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IAGB will host a market place and a virtual expo to support vendors and businesses during these challenging times. The vendors and businesses that advertise in our Republic day magazine can participate in market place promotions and digital expo. The market place is a platform featuring the businesses and all its products and services. The digital expo will be a live session, introducing the vendors businesses and live feed will be promoted on social media. |
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Our heartfelt thanks to everyone who donated to the Thanksgiving Food drive. We delivered over 275 lbs of groceries, serving 52 needy families, to Merrimack Valley Food bank.
To continue helping the needy families, we are continuing the food drive during this holiday season, for Lazarus house Food Pantry in Lawrence, MA, and Nashua Children's home, NH.
The year-end holidays are a time of reflection and thankful for all that we have. Many families continue to struggle with the challenges of poverty to put the food on the table, and the coronavirus pandemic has only made it more difficult to stay nourished and find food assistance. In the spirit of giving, please donate generously during this holiday season while brightening someone’s day and help a hungry family.
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Lazarus House Food Pantry
- Canned Vegetables
- Pasta (Any Type)
- Canned Pasta Sauce
- Canned Ravioli/Spaghetti
- White Rice (1lb bag or box)
- Macaroni & Cheese
- Peanut Butter
- Cereal Boxes
- Canned Soups
- Diapers
If you prefer, you may order online for delivery to Lazarus House (412 Hampshire St, Lawrence, MA 01841) from Amazon or Walmart Wish List
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Nashua Children's Home
- Mashed Potato
- Canned Vegetables
- Corn, Green Beans
- Rolls, Apple Cider,
- Apple Pie, Pumpkin Pie
- Cranberry juice, Orange Juice
- Cereals, etc
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you can drop off your generous donations at any of the following locations (Andover, Burlington, Hopkinton, Lexington, Littleton, Nashua, Newton, Westford, Winchester). If you prefer to have your donations picked up, please send an email to iagb@iagb.org.
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Sushil Motwani - 7 Christian Way, Andover MA
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Vaishali Gade - 19 Maryvale Rd, Burlington, MA
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Guru Samaga - 2 Honeysuckle Cir, Hopkinton, MA
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Kamala Raju - 4 Marshall Road, Lexington MA
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Sanjay Gowda - 8 McIntosh Ln, Littleton MA
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Veeresh Angadi - 24 Cherrywood Dr, Nashua NH
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Supriya Shekar - 336 Elliot St, #B, Newton MA
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Jeyanthi Ghatraju - 3 Barrister Dr, Westford, MA
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Yogita Miharia - 12 Wendell St, Winchester, MA
If you have any questions, please reach out to us at iagb@iagb.org.
We thank you for your generous donations!
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Editors: Yogita Miharia & Sanjay Kudrimoti
IAGB Communications
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