YFD -SECOND ANNUAL REPORT-2010-2011

FIRST SLUM VISIT- 22/8/2010:

v  Our first slum visit was undertaken by the Youth for Dharma Team on 22^nd August 2010 to Anjaneya Nagar Slum.

v  A team of 18 members reached the slum on that day and split ourselves into 3 teams, each consisting of 5 members.

v  We went to each and every house in the slum, interacted with them for few minutes and gave them prasadam, dollars, Muruga photos and “Nattrunai” book.

v  We also invited them to a temple located in their slum for a small session.

v  We people gathered there, we conducted a small bhajan session for one hour and asked them to participate.

v  Sri. Prabakar, Treasurer of Dharma Rakshana Samiti gave a small talk in Telugu about the basics of hindu way of workship and other day today activities.

v  Inspite of heavy rain, reasonable number of people gathered there and participated in the session.

v  There were all very happy and left home with a contented mind.

v  Our slum visit was followd by various activities of DRS like Thirupathi kalyanam, Sanyasi Yathirai, Saraswati nama jebam and Vilakku pooja which has made a great impact.

v  Now Anjaneya nagar slum dwellers regularly attend all our DRS activities.

INTELLECTUAL SESSION-12/09/2010:

v An intellectual session was organized on 12^th September 2010 at P.S. Senior Secondary School Mylapore.

v The session started at 4.00 p.m with a guided meditation conducted by Sri. Bijju Dev.

v Followed by this powerful start, Shri. Aravind Nilakandan gave a detailed talk on Temples covering their history, art and other scientific facts related to that.

v He shared with us a very informative presentation about the temples.

v He explained so many unknown facts with respect to the manner of construction of temples which were highly informative.

v Though the session was on continuos holiday and a rainy day, a good number of people turned up.

v They also gave valuable feedback about the session.

FIRST TEMPLE CLEANING- 2/10/2010

v  Temple Cleaning is one of the activities which is  undertaken to make the youth and temple goers understand the importance of temple, the purity and the importance of maintaining them clean.

v  We take a medium sized temple in any semi developed are slum area and cleam them completely.

v  This was organized on 2^nd October at  Muchandhi Vinayaka temple, Kakkan Colony, Nungambakkam, near Valuvar Kottam.

v  A team of 12 assembled and cleaned  the temple completely .

FIRST GUIDED MEDITATION AND STRESS MANAGEMENT PROGRAM:

v  This activity was conducted by Sri. Bijju Dev on 12^th December 2010 at P.S. Senior Secondary School Mylapore.

v  The session started at 10.30 am with a good number of people though it rained heavily.
Initially the program started with Guided meditation and followed by chanting ‘Aum’

v  Then Sri Bijju ji  gave a talk on managing stress and taught simple easy ways to overcome stress.

v  It was followed by a brief introduction on Yoga and few simple Yoga Asanaas were taught which could be practiced through our daily chores.

v This session brought a lot of relief to all the youngsters who were under stress and appreciated a lot.

SECOND HINDU SERVICE AND SPIRITUAL FAIR-25/01/2011 -30/1-01/2011

v This was one of the biggest initiatives that have made a lot of impact in the minds of the people.

v The hindu Service and Spiritual fair was organized by Global Foundation for Civilizational Harmony, where more than 100 Hindu Organisations took part by establishing their stalls and explaining their service rendered to this society.

v Youth for Dharma started its part in this part right from its inauguration. A team of Youth for Dharma members performed the invocation song on stage.

v We had a separate stall for Youth for Dharma.

v We displayed various videos which explains the significance of Hinduism and so many high value information advocated by it.

v We also distributed various items like, OHM pendants, Rudrakshas,  DVDs containing informative videos, A compilation of high value information, various books of Swamiji, etc.

v We also offered some Voice of India and SJM books for sale at a discounted price.

v The response we got for our stall cannot be expressed merely by words.

v So many youngsters came and expressed their willingness to participate in our activities. More that 250 people registered with us as members.

v Elders too showed so much interest to know about us and showered us with blessings.

INTELLECTUAL SESSION-06/02/2011:

v  The impact that was made by us in HSSF created lot of expectation about us in the minds of the people which posed an obligation upon us to conduct the best program post HSSF.

v  We met out the obligation by conducting an intellectual session on 6^th February 2011.

v  Swami Suddhananda gave a priceless discourse which hit the Bull’s eye.

v  His excellent choise of words, the way of presentation and above all his sense of humour, glued the audience to their seat.

v  Senior Advocate G.Rajagopalan chaired the function and gave a  piece of advice for youth today.

v  This was a fantastic session which impressed the people who attended the program a lot.

FOURTH HOSPITAL VISIT- 20/02/2011:

v A hospital visit was conducted on 20^th May 2011 at Kanchi Kamakodi Child Trust Hospital.

v  The activity was planned in a very short time of 2 days and short notice was given to people.12 People participated in the visit.

v  As usual we made ourselves into 3 teams and went to each and every bed and visited patients.

v  We spoke with them as their family member and gave prasadams and promised to pray for them to get well soon.

v  We had a small meeting outside the hospital premises and discussed bout the activity.

v  We stepped out of the hospital with complete satisfaction.

SPIRITUAL CAMP -12/03/2011 to 13/03/2011

v The 2nd Spiritual Camp was held on 12th and 13th March 2011 at at Swami Suddhananda Foundation for Self-Knowledge, Uthandi, East Coast Road, Chennai. 22

v Swamini Pramananda Saraswati of Purna Vidya presided over the camp.

v The first session of the camp commenced with a Prayer recitation and an introduction about Purna Vidya Gurukulam. It was followed by various sessions conducted by Swamini Amma covering various aspects of Purna Vidya like, Prayers, Story-telling, games and Bhajans etc.

v  The second day of the camp started with at 7.A.M with an enlightening session by Swamini Amma about Samskritis (Culture and Tradition) and Prashnottaris(FAQs).

v That was followed by an interesting activity where the participants were asked to teach the gathering for 5 minutes each about any topic in Purna Vidya. The session was very interactive and everyone did their best in taking purna vidya class in the given time

v Swamini Amma gave valuable feedback to everyone and distributed Purna Vidya books to the participants. Also the participants were allowed to ask their doubts and interact with Swamini Amma.

v The evening session of that day was presided over by Swami Sudhanandha, who gave an enlightening address to all of us.

v An interesting book called “Ari se Arjuna” written by David Frawley was distributed to all the participants.

v At the end of the day, all the participants left with complete satisfaction.

v They were very happy about learning the glorious aspects of Hinduism and receiving the blessings of Swamini Amma and Swami Sudhanandha.

WHAT IS SUCCESS?- WORKSHOP-03/04/2011:

v  This was entirely a different program in the history of Youth for Dharma.

v  Swamini Pramananda Saraswathi agreed to have an exclusive workshop for the Youth for Dharma members on the topic “What is success?”.

v  Firstly we were divided into 8 teams and were assigned the names of rivers.

v  Swamini Amma issued a questionnaire and asked us to discuss on the same. Once the discussion part was over the team leaders briefed out what was their team,s perspective.

v  Swamini Amma finally gave a concluding session on what is success.

v   The session was followed by a small meeting where so many people gave their names to take an active part in our activities.

SRIRAMA NAVAMI CELEBRATIONS-

v  Apart from our regular activities we decided to celebrate Sri rama Navami, exclusively as a Youth program.

v  It was planned and just within a week.

v  We distributed pamphlets in various temples for the program.

v  The program started with a bhajans session by the YFD members.

v  Shri. Krishna Jeganathan gave an inspiring talk about “Rama as an inspiration for youth.”

SLUM VISIT  8/05/2011  

v  The slum visit undertaken by the team of Youth for Dharma on 8^th May at Nehru Nagar (near Egmore) was a resounding success.

v  The agenda which was interaction with families and youngsters of the slum and door to door distribution of vibhuti-kumkum prasadam, Lord Murugan photo, Lord Muruga/Ganesh Dollar, a sloka book and Pujya Swami’s book, was carried out with élan by the team which was split into four groups.

v  The entire program lasted for about two hours which included door to door interaction in about 350 houses in the slum. Each group was welcomed by householders with happiness and love.

v  The team of 18 youngsters which was a mix of people having been to slums before and otherwise, had one of their real breaking points in their lifetime , to sound factual if not anything more.

v  The slum was a place filled with lot of obstacles and challenges for the team in terms of antagonist believers, rude elements, chauvinist political activists and rampant prevalence of exploitation of innocent & ignorant Hindu individuals and families. At the other end, were people who were kind hearted, highly devotional, genuinely affectionate and completely innocent in showering love.

v  The team was also confronted in person by some disgruntled elements of the slum but then, the team which was completely poised, calm and at peace, with devotion in their thoughts and service in their action won over the hearts and minds of the slum dwellers through their religious service and humble behaviour.

v  The feedback from the slum dwellers and especially from the women folk has been very positive and encouraging for the Youth for Dharma team to undertake such seva activities with devotion in mind, purity in heart, kindness in words and purpose in action in future.