the worli whisper

NOVEMBER 2020

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WORLI WHISPERTHE ROTARY CLUB OF BOMBAY, WORLI • DISTRICT 3141

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGEFestive Greetings to the Rotary Club of Bombay, Worli

Month of October was full of festivals and went by so fast with so many events and meetings happening.

We had very good speakers for the month of October.

Mr R Sridhar who is an Innovation Facilitator/Coach, Author and speaker spoke on the “Unlock your Innovation Potential” who spoke on the betterment of businesses. It was a wonderful talk on how to improve your business potential with simple steps.

On 8 October, we had a celebration online “Sunheri Yaadein” for our Charter Night. We had called singer Sandeep Damania who sang for 3 hours and songs were from the era of 1960s to 1980s. Further we had sent food hampers to all our members so that they can enjoy the evening with Food and Music.

On the same day, we inducted our new member “Hemant Kankariya” who is an Architect by profession and currently is a freelance Architect for MHADA projects. Earlier he worked for MHADA for 10 years before he started his own consultancy. His family consists of his wife Rashmi Kankariya who is a BE (Production) currently a housewife and two children, Ms Deeksa is studying Interior Designing and Master Rishi is studying in school. Hemant Kankariya will bring in his experience for our Rotary District Projects Ashiyana and also Under the Over Project (Beautification under the bridge) which our club intends to do.

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WORLI WHISPER NOVEMBER 2020

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Further on 15 October we had two lady speakers from Mudita Foundation, Ms Joyita Ambett (Co-Founder and Advisor) and Ms Jasmine Bhatia (Program Cordinator). It was an intense speaker event where dark truth of Human Trafficking were discussed.

On 22 October, we had our next gen speaker Ms Gauri Gandhi, daughter of Rtn Deepika and Ashok Gandhi, speaking to the club on the topic of “Life in my Generation, Through my lens” which was a very interesting topic and she spoke so well and she revisited all the small details of lives of parents which she feels that the parents have done too much to safeguard their family and now all of them should enjoy the life and keep the stress for the children to take and mould themselves as per their terms.

Further we had co-hosted with many clubs some very interesting weekly meetings, as the same were on Zoom, so our members could take the benefit and attend the same from the comfort of their home or office.

We had our regular Cancer Donations at Tata Memorial Hospital, Food Grains to Aadhar Tirth, Malnutrition project on a monthly basis and our GG Late FT Khorakiwala little hands and feet at SRCC going on a regular basis.

There was a blood collection drive which was organized by Rtn Pankaj Tanna at Dadar Station and collected 80 bottles of blood in a single day.

District Givers Gain project kick started in October and our Rotarian friends will be more than eager to participate in the same by giving old electronic machines, clothes and waste items and increase their personal giving in the Rotary Foundation.

Rtn Sachin Singhvi member of our club again donated plasma for a needy patient at H N Reliance Hospital.

We had a very big session on Zoom along with 85 co-host clubs and the topic was “TELEMEDICINES Today and Tomorrow….” Rtn Shirish Hastak was the leading panelist along with Bollywood Actor Shreyas Talpade and Dr Sanjay Arora. The District is thinking of taking this initiative to the next level and they are preparing for the same.

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At our Zugarewadi Village, 3 girl students were selected for Education Scholarship and they were thankful to the club for making them capable for such achievements.

DGs dream Impactful Project “NGO Product Support & Promotion” was launched “Diwali Zoom Mela” on Thursday, 8 October. Our club was the highest in pre-sales order collection from members to help these NGOs to sell their goods during Diwali. Our club collected orders worth Rs 1.10 lacs.

We got a letter from the Commissioner of Police for 3,500 highend masks and 2,000 PPE kits which we have to deliver to them by month end or 1st week of November. The masks have been funded from the crowd funding done by our club where we collected Rs 5,15,000 approx and after expenses and taxes, we have around Rs 4,60,000 collected. The complete money will be used to fund the masks for the Mumbai Police and will be handed over to the Office of the Commissioner of Police Mumbai. This project was done with the help of Fuel a Dream team who helped us raise the funds through crowdfunding.

Our Club along with Rotary Club of Bombay Hills South donated a Water Cooler to Guru Nanak School Mahim and this will benefit 500 school children.

A whopping Rs 30 lacs collected through Crowd Funding for the District Project Malnutrition-Poshak Aahar, RCB Worli being the Lead Club and fund raising done by RCB Pier and RCB hanging Garden. Our own Rtn Netra Nairi is leading the project for the District.

Another Global Grant project of Rotary Club Of Uptown which got approved by Generous contribution by our very own Rtn Sunil Siraslewala. Rotary Club of Bombay Worli will be the Co-Host during the handing over of the machines to Manav Seva Sangh. The donations will be ophthalmic machines.

We are now in the position to execute our own GG project Covid 19 and we shall be donating 9 HFNC machines to Tata Memoriaal Hosptial and 5000 N 95 masks and also PPE Kits.

Our ongoing projects of Aashiyana District Housing project, Annapoorna District Meal project, District Malnutriton project,

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Rotary Angels, Givers Gains and many more district projects which are in the pipeline.

Happy reading,

Nimesh Sanghrajka President

Rotary Club of Bombay, Worli

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5Editorial

EDITORIALThe October month normally known to be with unbearable heat and all but for the Worlians it was a different experience. Few of the club members including yours truly got into the positive side of ‘Covid’. In this pandemic time the positive word looks so negative that everyone who gets to know that so and so is positive, he/she starts looking at every negative side of what must have gone wrong? The only good part is that all of us are absolutely in good shape and back to our normal life with everyday routine.

This is the month when the festivities start and they will go on till the Christmas time and the year will end. So many of us are waiting for this year to end, again on POSITIVE note and forget about what happened during this year. Till then let us enjoy the festivities and stay safe.

From the team “Worli Whispers” a very happy, healthy and prosperous Deepawali to all.

Rtn. Yeshwant Datay

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6Purshotam Mahina

PURSHOTAM MAHINA I thought of calling it Purshotam Mahina Bulletin instead of October Bulletin 2020 keeping in mind the extra month in the Hindu calendar that is inserted to keep the lunar and solar calendars aligned. It comes approximately every 4th year and this time it was from 18 September to 16 October 2020.

Scientific calculation for this Extra month of the Hindu Calendar The Moon takes about 27.3 days to make one complete orbit around the earth. The earth orbits around the sun once every 365.2422 days. The earth and the moon in 27.3 days have moved as a system about 1/12 of the way around the sun. This means that from one full moon to the next full moon, the moon must travel 2.2 extra days before it appears again as a full moon, due to the curve of the earth’s orbit around the sun. Ultimately, this creates a variance of 10.87 days a year between a lunar year and a solar year. To compensate for this difference, the additional month is added after every 32.5 months on average.

Surprisingly, it is observed that the season in which it falls often gets extended. For eg., this year it started on 18 September which is the end of the monsoon season, and we saw how the rains were creating a havoc right till the middle of October.

This month the ladies of the Rotary Club Of Worli got together on 21 October 2020 on Zoom to celebrate the Navratri Festival.

Woman signifies “Janani” someone who creates life out of a seed and nurtures it into an independent individual…almost like the creator himself. The ‘First sound’ which comes out of a small child has been reserved for a mother, be it Aa in Aai or Amma or Ba or Ma in any Indian Language.

In India a woman is called a Shakti, a power or a force behind all good things, which cannot be quantified. There is a strong Universal Force Behind every woman which we personify as Devi Ma. We celebrate Navratri across India to remind us of our connection to this Universal Force.

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7Purshotam Mahina

Netra started the session by sharing information on how Navratri is celebrated among the Kshatriyas in Maharshtra. Paula informed of how the Pujo is celebrated in the eastern states of West Bengal and Odisha and also Bangladesh. Sabina spoke about the 9 Shakti Peeths which are formed by the 9 parts of the Durga which fell on earth and became sacred pilgrim sites. Prerna sang a beautiful Garba from the Gujarati Movie ‘Helaro’. This was followed by Bhajan sang by Pooja and Kanan. The icing on the cake was Tejal looking stunning in a very traditional Chania Choli. Overall it was a very interactive and informative talk.

This month The District Impactful Project “Diwali Zoom Mela” took off on 8 October, wherein it was decided to help promote the goods made by various NGOs to boost their creativity. Many of the Anns supported this Project by generously buying from these NGOs for the Diwali season.

As informed earlier, a water cooler was installed in the Guru Nanak School last month. This was inaugurated on 22 October by The President, Nimesh Sanghrajka and The Secretary and President Elect Dipti Rajda of our club. It was a very disheartening feeling to be in an empty and a quiet school with no children in sight. We met up with the Principal of the School Smt. Sanjit Kaur who informed us of various problems faced by the under privileged students, who are finding it difficult to take lessons online. Let us hope the Pandemic ends soon, so the children go back to school.

Thanking all the Ladies of the group for the immense support they keep giving behind any program undertaken.

Stay Safe.

Lots of Love, Janhavi Sanghrajka

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8Our Members Speak

OUR MEMBERS SPEAKRTN. TAIZOON KHORAKIWALA

My journey in Rotary started in the 60s. My father Fakhruddin Khorakiwala was a Rotarian at Bombay Main and was honored as a “Citizen of Mumbai”, a title given to just a handful of people including Ratan Tata. I learnt the 4-way test by heart and I could recite when I was in school and even today, without a mistake.

My second exposure to Rotary was as a Rotaract member at St Mary’s school. Our main project was serving Worli dairy flavored milk during school recess and we used the proceeds to adopt a slum near Worli naka, bringing water, sanitation and medical facilities to it. I served under Rippan Kapur, who then founded CRY and died early in his 30s.

My journey into RCBW was due to my wife who encouraged me to join Rotary. I asked Quresh Karachiwala to introduce me a few years ago and was warmly welcomed. I found yet another family in Rotary...in addition to my birth one, my wife’s, my BITS Pilani one, my OPM Harvard one and the SwitzGroup one.

In Rotary I’ve concentrated on my strength... which is financial. I support all ventures of the clubs when required.

• I supported our club’s 200 pediatric cardiac surgery project.• I’ve given thru RI GG three sets of Opthalmic equipment to KEM

hospital under the leadership of Dr Sheela Kerkar. This was introduced to me by Jayanth Nairi.

• Currently we are doing pediatric orthopedic surgeries at SRCC (Haji Ali). This was introduced to me by Pankaj Tanna. We hope we can continue this indefinitely... the current commitment is for 250 surgeries and we are on our 30th one.

I also support fellowship, civilisational values, human rights and society centered leadership in Rotary, India and the world at large.

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9Our Members Speak

I’m in the bakery and related businesses... SwitzGroup was started by my father who also incubated Akbarallys, Wockhardt and Monginis. It started in Saudi Arabia and also has manufacturing operations in UAE, India, Oman, Greece, Turkey, Sri Lanka, Australia and Philippines. I’ve run it since January 1980. The important verticals are industrial bakery, retail bakery and bakery ingredients. SwitzGroup is also in egg processing and egg farming. Like Rotary it too has four guiding values.

• SWITZ FAMILY...all those who are impacted by its well being are legitimate stakeholders who need to be considered in all its decisions.

• TEAMWORK is the foundation of great enterprise.• leadership’s primary role is to create a LEARNING

ORGANISATION• great EXECUTION being the necessary commercial part to retain

the value created.

I have also dabbled in hotel and real estate development, film production and publishing.

Edith is my soulmate and completes me. She has helped me to grow as a human being, husband, father, brother, friend, relative and in wisdom.

I have three girls Tahera (doctor/MS in pharmaceutical medicine) mother of two living in Dublin, Ireland and Maryam (BBA, Babson) living in Dubai and our retail expert in the business, Trish (MBA Harvard) who lives in LA and works at PIMCO...and also two boys Adel (father of two, Dubai based) and Adam also in the business. Currently I’m engaged in a project to transfer the ownership of my businesses to my children to find newer directions to my life.

Both my parents and almost all my aunts and uncles came from Palanpur, Gujarat. My parents coming out of Palanpur made me comfortable in Mumbai and in India. My in laws span global cultures. Jamaica, Mauritius, Philippines and Lebanon. I’ve succeeded in making my children comfortable in the world.

The blessings of the Almighty are never ending. Even when he gave me covid...it was asymptomatic.

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10Our Members Speak

RTN. PANKAJ TANNA

Age 43 was the turning point for my life.

• My son was born (after a 12 year struggle). • I started an absolutely new line of business (C and F Agency for

Castrol), • I got an internet connection at home and created my own email

address, • I bought my first shares of Aban Loyd (to which I owe everything) • and most importantly, I was introduced to an institution called

ROTARY.

I am now pankajtanna43 for life.

I would like to thank Kiran and Prerna (Vora) for literally forcing me to join the Rotary Club of Bombay Worli.

I still recollect Yeshwant doing my house visit (pompously suited and booted with 3 others), and giving ROTARY GYAAN to my mother as well. The house visits these days are totally different!

After some initial disappointments, I got into the groove and have been fairly active in all Club matters after that.

People wrongly believe that we have to contribute to Rotary – I (and most others) are actually net receivers.

Friends, extended family, fellowships, empathy, learning about interpersonal relationship management, wonderful overnighters to the best places (at low costs), Leadership Training, wonderful speakers, ability to do impactful community service. You name it – Rotary and especially ROTARY WORLI gave it.

Most importantly It gave me the opportunity of thinking big – and created a passion for THALASSEMIA PREVENTION AND CARE. Who gives you an open cheque book to spend Rs. 40 lakhs to dream your dream? And enables you to give a presentation at a National Seminar on Thalassemia.

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11Our Members Speak

Meena and Varun have been an integral part of this journey, and they too have enjoyed, and continue to enjoy Rotary. Without their participation and involvement, our Rotary journey would not have been enjoyable.

I have had the privilege of working in the District — as the Director, I am heading the Medical I Avenue in 20–21, Asst Governor in 2019–20, Asst Trainer in 2018–19, Avenue Head for Community Service (Medical ) in 2017–18, and Medical I Avenue Co Chair in earlier years.

I am presently in the mode of conserving my health and wealth, looked after by Meena. Varun graduated from H R College in B A F and did a 2 year post Grad Diploma at ISDI WPP in the field of Marketing and Media. He is presently working in an Advertising Agency.

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12Our Members Speak

RTN. PAULA GOEL

In the spring of 1989, I met a brilliant 22 yr old young man in BJ Medical college Pune, who seemed perpetually lost. He was intriguing with a fascination for science fiction which both of us seemed to share. Little did I know that I was to share my life with him over 31 yrs. My husband Saurab and I met when we were very young in medical college. He was my senior by 1 year. In those days, life consisted of going to college, attending rigorous class schedules and medical ward rounds. Looking back, even I am amazed as to how love blossomed when there was so less time to spend with each other. Never the less, love did blossom not only to us, but also to a lot of batchmates as well, and we all wondered where life would take us and which postgraduation would we do, after completing MBBS.

Saurab was topper all through out his academic days, right from 12 std when he 3rd in Pune board, then 1st in MD medicine and 1st in DM cardiology from Nair hospital. I was also topper and was within the first 5 students to get into BJ medical college, post which I did my postgraduation in pediatrics, then further specialization in adolescent medicine.

We got married in Jan 1993 and our son Ashish was born on 3 September, 1995. Saurab topped in DM cardiology exam and was picked up by Hinduja hospital where he worked for 1.5 yrs and then joined Cumballa Hill Hospital as an independent consultant. In those days, I was working with Bombay Municipal Corporation as a medical officer. I had exposure to wide variety of medical cases (children and women) and I continued to pursue my academics as my son was growing.

Both Saurab and I had a vision of having healthcare facility which would provide quality based healthcare services at affordable cost to patients. We were able to turn this dream into reality when we started Fayth Clinic on 28 july 2008. That same year, in the month of December, I lost my younger brother and our entire family was shattered. It took us a long time to bear the loss. During this period, my only solace was work and Fayth Clinic prospered, by grace of God. Today, we have 3 diagnostic centres which are

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13Our Members Speak

NABH accredidated and ISO 9001:2015 certified with over 2 lakh happy patients.

Joining Rotary was one of the best decisions which we took. We were anyways doing a lot of medical camps & social work , however Rotary exposed us and brought forth another dimension of service to society. We made good friends by sharing the same values & principals. On a personal front, Saurab, myself and Ashish are fond of travelling and we have travelled extensively across the globe. Ashish has completed his MBBS. Till today, we love science fiction and will never miss any science fiction film and Star Trek.

This year, both Saurab and I lost our fathers within 15 days of each other and also our pug George. It’s been a difficult year with parental loss and Covid, however looking back, I think God gives us innate strength to bear the losses and continue with life. Our other pet Gina continues to bring joy to our lives.

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14Our Members Speak

RTN. RAKESH JAIN

I am Rakesh Jain, a diamond merchant.

I come from a small village Bijainagar located in Ajmer, Rajasthan.

I was 17 when I came to Bombay and started working. My initial years in the diamond industry were full of hard work.

Today I’m blessed with a beautiful wife Jaya who is a home maker, 2 daughters, elder one is Mansi. She is studying fashion and working as a diamond graduate, and Garima who’s aspiring to become a lawyer.

My son Rishi is the youngest studying in 8th grade. We are a healthy and happy family. I have respect in the society, some amazing friends and a good life.

With everything happening around it’s so important to use your voice for a good cause and help the underprivileged and I am only being able to do that with the help of the Rotaract Club.

Due to my language barrier I didn’t think I would fit in but I met incredible people here who helped me with that and now I proudly call them my friends.

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15Speakers and Fellowship

SPEAKERS AND FELLOWSHIPDATE SPEAKER / FELLOWSHIP TOPIC1 Oct, 2020 Mr R Sridhar Unlock the Real Power of Ideation

8 Oct, 2020 Charter Night party and Musical night Sandeep Damania was the singer

15 Oct, 2020 Ms Joyita Ambett & Ms Jasmine Bhatia Human Trafficking What Where Who and How

22 Oct, 2020 Ms Gauri Gandhi Life in our Generation, through my lens

30 Oct, 2020 Rtn Taizoon Khorakiwala, Rtn Sachin Singhvi and Rtn Dr Bellani

Their experience on overcoming Covid after turning positive

CO-HOSTINGRotary Club of Bombay Worli Co-hosted with the following Clubs:

3 October, 2020: Webinar “How safe is Air Travel during Current Pandemic”

4 October, 2020: Musical Programme Tribute to Late Singer S P Balasubramaniam

8 October, 2020: DGs Dream Impactful Project “NGO Product Support & Promotion”

We being the Lead club, hosted the District event “Telemedicine Today and Tomorrow” and was attended by 86 cohost clubs and had 150 attendees. Speaker were Rtn Shirish Hastak, Actor Shreyas Talpade and Dr Sanjay Arora.

16 October, 2020: We were cohost for an event “Is Equity Investment an Art or a Science?” by Mr Saurabh Mukherjea.

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16Speakers and Fellowship

16 October, 2020: We were co-hosting an event “The Start up Show”

17 October, 2020: We co-hosted an event with Rotary Club of Bombay Hills South on Demystifying Spirituality by Pooja Tidke.

17–24 October, 2020: The district held a contest for Navratri and each day there were prizes to be won for best dress, Best couple dress, Best Lady dress, etc

18 October, 2020: We co-hosted another event on “KNOW STROKE FAST”

21 October, 2020: Co-hosted an event “What does your customer really want”, by Manjiri Joshi

25 October, 2020: 154 clubs together hosted The Roast & Toast Series Life before and after Governorship.

28 October, 2020: We had co-hosted and came together to celebrate the End Polio Date and Senior Rotarians spoke about how Rotary worked so closely with all clubs in India to end Polio from India.

30 October, 2020: We had an extra meeting called for getting inputs on Personal Experiences with Covid 19 and we had our own Rotarians as speakers who have gone through their experiences with Covid 19 when they were tested positive and how they fought their way back and got negative results of Covid 19. The speakers were Rtn Taizoon Khorakiwala, Rtn Dr Vijay Belani and Rtn Sachin Singhvi. It was an interactive session where important points relating to Covid 19 were discussed.

31 October, 2020: The district organised a musical event to end the month of October with songs, ghazals and Navratri songs sung by Samir & Dipalee.

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17Humor Corner

HUMOR CORNER

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18Fun Corner

FUN CORNER

the worli whisper

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