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| Jai Shree Krishna!!! | January 2006 Newsletter | |
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Wishing you all a Very Happy and Healthy 2006 !!! 2005 was a very memorable year indeed, when the Hindu people of Leeds finally took charge of shaping the future development of our Temple and our Community. The elections finally took place and since then a lot of events have taken place with tremendous support and encouragement from all the members of our community. Our committee are very thankful to all of you for making our efforts a success by attending and participating and donating your time and money towards the various events we organised. IT WAS A SHOW TO REMEMBER!!! One of the most successful event thus year was the Deepawali Show at the Leeds Grammar School, which was attended by over 450 people. Most of them came dressed in the finest Traditional Indian Dresses, as we had requested. I was feeling especially proud of all the men who made this special effort. What a Sight! It really felt like an Indian Festival indeed. The evening’s proceedings were started by welcome messages and the Gayatri Mantra by Siddhant Dalal - Hindi, Neil Saha – Bengali, Amol Joshi – Marathi, Aditya Sreedharan – Tamil, Shivraj Patel – Gujarati, led by Neil Patel and Deven Chopra. This was matched by the most exciting performances ever seen. Each of the dances were fantastic and very individual, from the beautifully mimed story dance depicting the duel between Shree Ram and King Ravan by Devika and Navya, the artistic Kathak Dance by Supriya Dharmadhikari and Shilpa Ghare to the exciting bollywood dances by the Pragati Mandal girls Priya, Roopa, Manisha and Tishila and the really mesmerising performance by the three sisters Nishani, Nanuja, Banuja, of The Northern Tamil Association. This was followed by the truly emotional performances by the Leeds University students Dev Datt, Bhavin, Jigar, Apurva and Vivek and the house raising finale by Bhavesh and Friends, the Hindu Student’s Forum boys and girls, who brought the house down with their highly energetic Ras Garba performances. The singing too was ‘top class’ and highly professional. Smt.Supriya Nagrajan and Smt. Chitra Ramakrishnan were setting new standards for all of us to try and emulate. Harshlaji, Devendraji and Kishorji also sang some truly moving songs followed by spellbinding performances on the Sitar and Santoor by Reena Kukadia, Kamaljit Kaur with Upneet Singh on Tabla. Hindu Garba Group did the Ras Garba to end the day’s entertainment which even the Deputy Headmaster Mr.Jolly took part in the afterwards. He was overawed by the sheer excitement generated by all the performances. He had never seen such a variety of dances and singing before and was feeling humbled by the artistic talent within the Hindu community and what they had to offer the rest of the communities of Britian. He was very proud of the Hindu boys of Leeds Grammar, who had never taken part in something like this before. They too should feel very proud of their heritage. The headmaster was so impressed that the Hindu community have been given permission to hold next year’s Deepawali function and any other events at the school. All this was only possible because of a dedicated group of helpers such as Maheshbhai, Rajubhai, Induben, Shyamji, Amratlalji, Urmilaben, Daxaben as well as Neil Patel and his team and all the committee members, who worked tirelessly throughout the week, to make everything come together on the day. We are very grateful to all of them and hope that you’ll be with us for a long time to come. Please forgive me if I have missed out the names of anyone who had also helped. NEW YEAR’S DAY CELEBRATIONS On New Year’s Day some 40 people gathered in the community hall where the Deepawali Video was shown on a big screen followed by light a light meal, which everyone had brought and then lots of party games were played, which was enjoyed by all. It made a great day for all of the families who made the effort. ALL DAY BHAJAN KIRTAN All Day Bhajan Kirtan took place on 2nd January to celebrate New Year’s Day on Sun.2nd January. The dedicated members of the Leeds Mahila Mandal, the Swadhiyay Mandal, the Ramkrishna Bhajan Mandal and the Punjabi Sabha ladies sang bhajans with great joy and created the tremendous feeling of togetherness to give a great start to the year 2006. A big Thank You to all the ladies who cooked the Bhojan Prashad for everyone on the day. AWARDS FOR OUTSTANGING HINDU YOUNGSTERS OF LEEDS For the first time ever six young Hindu boys and girls were awarded trophies in recognition of their outstanding achievements in the past year, by the Hindu Charitable Trust (Leeds). This took place at a ceremony at Cleakheaton Town Hall, where the packed house saw the awards presented by the chief guest, the Deputy Lord Mayor of Cleakheaton, after a short video presentation of their achievements. The awards were as follows: 1) Preetham Joshi (17) achieved 8 A* and 5 As in his GCSE last year, the highest ever for Allerton High School. 2) Deven Chopra (16) is the current Yorkshire Schoolboy Champion Boxer at 50kg weight, hoping to be the first Hindu British Schoolboy Champion later this year. Also 5 A* for GCSE last year. 3) Minesh Tanna (19) who achieved 5 As at A-Level and the fifth highest score in the UK for Economics. He also played Table Tennis for Yorkshire, now studying Law at Oxford. 4) Reena Kukadia (20) the only Hindu Sitar player from Leeds to be chosen to play for the South Asian Music Youth Orchestra. At present studying to be an optician at Bradford Uni. 5) Dimple Khetani (23) who achieve two Ones at Fashion Design at Leeds University and now working for a leading fashion house in Leeds and London. 6) Supreeth Joshi (14) the youngest Hindu Air Cadet achieving his flying badges and aiming to be an airline pilot by the time he’s 22. The presentation was followed by a dinner and live entertainment organised by Smt. Supriya Nagrajan, the artistic director of Manasamitra. The Karaoki singing was a great success for a lot of budding singers who were waiting for such an opportunity to show their hidden talents. We are hoping to put on more of such entertainment at our newly refurbished stage at our Community Centre, in the near future. If you too would like an opportunity to sing, please contact Shree Devendra Sadhnani on 0113 26888052 or the Hindu Temple on 0113 2307106.Special thanks to our Maheshbhai, Shyamji and Ganshiyambhai for helping with refurbishing the stage. FORTHCOMING PROGRAMMES FOR JANUARY AND FEBRUARY Republic Day Celebrations at the Temple This year we’ll be celebrating India’s Republic Day on Sunday 29th Jan. at 6.30pm. On this day the Sunday Aarti will be conducted earlier at 6pm. A special entertainment show of devotional music, quiz and song and dance will start at 6.30pm until 7.30pm, followed by a special showing of the biographical movie Veer Savarkar, a patriot who gave his whole life in the struggle for achieving the independence for India. Don’t be too late if you want a seat on the day. Anger Management - By Samani Pratibha Pragya, M.A., Samani Punya Pragya – Sunday 5th February 2006 at 5pm at the Hindu Temple Most of us find it quite difficult to control ourselves when we become annoyed or angry and do and say things, which we later regret. Once spoken the damage is done and no amount of saying, “Sorry!” can repair the damage. We are very fortunate to have Samani Pratibhaben and Punyaben from London, who give talks and conduct workshops for managers and people in high positions on the art of managing anger, as prescribed by our Dharma. Please do not miss this great opportunity to listen and learn from their experience. Maha Shivratri Celebrations – On Sunday 26th February 2006 Maha Shivratri falls on Sunday this year and we are planning an All Day Celebration starting from 10am until Midnight. There will be Rudhra Abhishek Poojas at 10am onwards with the MAHA RUDRA ABHISEKH POOJA at 6PM followed by Dhwaja Rohan at 7.30pm and Aarti. Bhajan kirtan will continue after that until the final Aarti at midnight. Maha Shivratri Pooja is regarded as one of the most auspicious poojas in the whole year, only the fortunate few get the opportunity to perform this pooja once a year. If you would like to take the opportunity to be one of the Yajmaans for the Maha Pooja please give your name to our Punditjis or any of the committee members. We are especially requesting that each male Yajmaan should come suitably dressed wearing the traditional Pitaamber (the Orange Dhoti) when performing the Maha Pooja. Pitaambers will be given FREE OF CHARGE to all the Yajmaans. Fal prahar will be served throughout day. HCT Membership We are specially requesting all our members to renew their memberships for the year 2006. A list of all those who have already renewed their membership is displayed on the notice-board. If your name is not on this list then you need to update your membership. Please leave £10 for the membership fees in the envelope which our punditji will provide, and please do not forget to add your name and address on it. Gau Pooja and Lori at the Temple Tremendous excitement was created on the evening of Friday 13th Jan this year when Gau Pooja was conducted by well over 400 Hindu brothers, sisters and children who had a great opportunity to do pooja of a living Cow, kindly brought over from Heron Farm by Mick, who was truly moved by this Hindu ritual. Our aim was for our young boys and girls to physically see and touch the holy cow while doing the pooja and hopefully their parents will remind them how and why we Hindus regard the cow and all other living creatures with such reverence. |
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| Gau maata beautifully decorated for Pooja |
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Punditjis starting the ceremony for Gau Pooja |
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LORI bonfire and Pooja. 
For the first time ever the harvest festival of LORI was also celebrated on the same day, by lighting a huge bonfire and doing pooja to help purify and invigorate ourselves by removing all the cob-webs from the past year and making a fresh new start of doing worthwhile things in the rest of the year for both our self and our samaj. Pal Sandhir and Amratlal Bhardwaj’s family and friends provided the traditional mouth-watering Saag and Maki-ki-roti, which was enjoyed very much by everyone. GUJARATI AND HINDI NEWSLETTER It has not been possible to translate the whole newsletter in Gujarati and Hindi due to the shortage of time, however we will have a translated copy available in Hindi and Gujarati from the Temple by this weekend. Please call in at the Temple for your copy. |
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Leeds Hindu Mandir