DEEPAM Volume 22, Issue 4

Hindu Temple 13010 Arbor Street, Omaha, NE, 68144

Page –1

Inside this Issue

Chairman’s Message 2-3

President’s Message 4

Sri Ravi Shankar’s Discourse 5

Committee Members 6

Temple Office Bearers (2014-15) 7

Annual Financial Report (2013-2014) 8

Current Financial Report 9

Financial Report (2003-2013) 10

AMD Program (Call for donations) 11

Sahasra Modaka Homam– Volunteer pictures 12

Temple on Social Media 13

Volunteer Appeal 14

Page -2 Volume 21 Issue 2

Namaskar

It is almost a year working as a Chair person of Board of Trustees of the Hindu Temple. I am enjoying working with the board members and the President and his commitee. Mr. President and his committee is doing an excellent job in conducting the business efficiently and achieving all the targets.

I will like to say that with the construction of the new

rooms for the children in Bal Vihar and youth group ,

the admission numbers have gone up. The volunteer

teachers are also doing an excellent job in teaching

young generation and we all thank the teachers for

their hard work. With the new extended social hall

space, a number of dance and other activities have

gone up. These activities keeps our communities to-

gether and best chance to meet parents and children at

one place, exchange views and extend friendship.

I was very lucky to participate in the biggest function of

my life time, Maharudram celebration, which was orga-

nized under the leadership of Bishu Sahib and assisted

by Joshiji, Dashji, Sureshji and Tej Sahib and others. I

never imagined that it will be of this magnitude. The

volunteers did an excellent job in getting every thing

done in a exemplary manner. Congratulations to Bishuji

and puja committee to take a big step of gathering 80

plus priest in Omaha for this function.

Hindu temple EC and Board had been talking of buying

the houses for the priests for the last few years. This

year, with the cooperation from Mr. President and his

empire and Board of trustees took the big step and de-

cided to buy houses for the priests. I took this work on

myself and have bought two houses already. Pandit

Vidya Shankerji moved in April and pandit Damodarji

moved in June 2014. We were lucky to buy both hous-

es close to each other at very reasonable prices. The

Hindu Temple has been paying $750.00 for the apart-

ment rent per month. Now our payment is less than

$700/month and we are building equity for the temple.

We will be buying another house for the priests. In my

opinion, it was a right step to take for the temple.

The VCN committee under the chairman ship of Adid-

amji, is bringing SRI SRI Ravi Shankarji from India for

pravachan and education on Sept 13-14, 2014. The

committee has already presented the budget which has

been approved by EC and Board.

The preparation are being done for the celebration of

Maha-Kumbha-Abhishekam in 2015 under the guidance

of Devender Agrawalji and are progressing very well.

The Indianization of the social hall will be accomplished

in the very near future.

…..Continued on Page-3

Message from Chairman

Volume 22 Issue 4

Jyestha Krishna Dwadashi

Jaya Samvatsaram

(June 23, 2014)

Page -3 Volume 21 Issue 2

Message from Chairman

Volume 22 Issue 4

………. Continued from page 2

We are lucky that the property on the North side of the

temple is for sale and we have a chance to buy it. It is

an excellent opportunity for the temple to buy this

property and expand. I am a person of positive atti-

tude and think that we will be able to purchase it. If

we will not buy it, we will be land locked and will have

no room to expand. I will request every body to sup-

port the temple and buy this property. I designated

Jagdishji, Sanjayji, Dashji and Bishuji (three com-

mittees) to find out all detail of the property, use of the

property and how to buy (funds) and they are working

on this project tirelessly. Almighty God will help us.

As our temple is progressing well and the needs are

growing. To meet the demands of the devotees, under

the leadership of Ravipatiji, we are hiring another

priest.

In the end, I will like to thank everybody working for

the development of the temple and request everyone

to work together for the betterment of our Temple.

May God bless you all.

Prem Arora

Chair person Board of Trustees

Please respond to htom.volunteers @gmail.com, if you wish to volunteer, so that we could add your

name in our database.

Name:__________________________Email:______________________________

Contact number (best time to reach):_________________________

Mention the area:____________________________________________________

Thanks,

Volunteer Committee

Hindu Temple Charitable Run Raffle

Would you like to Volunteer?

Mr. Arun Pondicherry and 7 others from the Indian community have planned to partici-

pate a charitable run , “Market to Market” race on 10/11/14 from Omaha to Lincoln.

A raffle was drawn on April 5th, 2014 that raised about $1,800 for the Temple

Winning numbers: 1975, 1993, 1604, 1990, 1350, 1325 (all prizes were claimed)

First Prize: iPad mini

Second Prize: Kindle Fire HD

Third Prize: $50 Walmart Gift Card

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Page -4 Volume 21 Issue 2

Volume 22 Issue 4

Message from the President Respected Devotees/Patrons, Namaste! Aum Shri Ganeshaaya Namah! With the grace of Lord Prasanna Ganapati, all the reli-gious, spiritual, and educational activities are running smoothly with the help of our priests (Damodarji and Vidyashankar ji), temple sevak/shilpi (Chandrasekaran ji), and our spirited devotees and enthusiastic volunteers. My appreciation and gratitude goes to the past Presi-dents and Chairs of the Board for their services and dedi-cation which have been instrumental in our day to day running of our temple and progress we have made for our community. The progress we have made in past few years are visible and can be realized with increasing number of devotees and exponential growth in temple-related activities and finances (see at https://www.facebook.com/HinduTemple.Omaha.Nebraska). However, it has brought new challenges and opportuni-ties. We had the highest number of puja services per-formed maximum non-pledge donations and associated expenses. The major portion of temple expansion, reno-vation and remodeling project was completed on sched-ule, however, we still have unfinished Projects to bring its old glory. I want to emphasize the significance of our volunteers. It was my honor to witness the spirit of volunteerism at our temple every day. On behalf of the outgoing Executive Committee of Hindu Temple, I want to express my sin-cere gratitude to all the members of Executive Commit-tee and you (listed below) for your selfless dedication, enthusiasm and generous support to make a difference: Education: Archana Janakiram, Arunima Dasgupta,

Deepa Kashyap, Manju Mehta, Monica Arora, Natasha Keshwani, Nina Mote, Rajesh Sharma, Ramkrishna Prasad, Rekha Patel, Zinny Satpathy, Sudha Agarwal, Vandana Singh, Purnima Singh, Sanjay Singh, Phani Tej Adidam, Alekha Dash

Volunteer Services: Sundara Chokkara, Ambika Jayaram, Anusha Narasimhan, Rama Venkatesh, Deepa Kashyap, Viji Suresh, Gayathri Ram; Keerthi and Ranjith

Mahaprasad Team: Gowridhar Madu, Sundar Chokkara, Deepa Kashyap, daily Prasad packing volunteers

Temple Tours, Public Relation & Community Out-reach: Nina Mote, V.T. Ramakrishnan, Vandana Singh, Sanjay Singh, Natasha Keshwani, Jayaram Na-garajan, Ramakrishna Prasad; Alekha Dash

Finance Team: Murali Deshpande, VT Ramakrishnan, Sayikishore Repakula, Ramnathan Narayanan

Puja and Religious Services: Suresh Seshadri, Ram Bishu, Phani Tej Adidam, Shantaram Joshi, Alekha Dash, Ashwin Patel, Nirmala Rajagopalan; Jayaram Nagarajan, Archana (Priest Scheduling)

Volunteer Priests: Ramasubramanian, Vijay Anand,

Srini Nedunoori, Jayaram Nagarajan, Tej Adidam, Ram Bishu, Shantaram Joshi, Alekha Dash

Cultural Committee: Deepa Kashyap, Anuja Rokade, Kavitha Sreenivas, Kritika Somanna, Keerthi Ranjit, Priya Murugan, Madhulika Suri, Meera Kashyap, Shab-na Babu, Usha Devaraju, Maya Krishnan, Vandana Singh, Anusha Narasimhan

I.T. & Communications: Kameshwar Myneni, Muralidhar Chintapalli, Jayaram Nagarajan, Vijaya Anand Kannan, Ven-katesh Beddapura ji, Srini Nedunoori ji

Facility management: Srinivas Mallipudi Publications: Chtiibabu Guda, Shantaram Joshi Vedantic Center of Nebraska: Phani Tej Adidam

Recruitment Committee: Sriram Ravipati, Bhavana J. Dave, Meera Dewan, Swaroop Nijhawan, Naresh Dewan, Phani Tej Adidam, Jayaram Nagarajan, Shantaram Joshi, Mahendra Bansal, Shantaram Joshi

Mahakumbhabhishekam 2015 (MKA 2015): Devendra K. Agrawal

Finally, I express my heartfelt thanks to my life partner, Bha-vana J. Dave for her enthusiastic support and encouragement and for loving blessings from Papa, Janakbhai R. Dave.

We have tried our best to enhance your ownership to our tem-ple, improve our temple staff heartfelt involvement in your reli-gious and spiritual need, significantly enhance devotee’s satis-faction, and temple involvement in community outreach. I un-derstand that we have been partially successful in these goals. However, I am confident that with your enthusiasm, commit-ment and philanthropic investment, it is very much within our reach.

I highly appreciate your continued support to our temple. Al-ways seeking the blessings of Lord Prasanna Ganapati,

Dr. Rakesh K. Singh

President, Executive Committee (htom.rsingh@gmail.com)

..

Page -5 Volume 21 Issue 2 Volume 22 Issue 4

COMMITTEE mEMBERS

Page -6 Volume 22 Issue 4

Priest: Pundit Vidya Shankar,

Pundit Damodara Bhattar

Sevak: Chandrasekhar Karmegam

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

President: Rakesh K. Singh 402-292-3790

Vice President: Jayaram Nagarajan

Secretary: Deepa Kashyap

Asst. Secretary: Vijay Anand Kannan

Treasurer: Murali Deshpande

Asst Treasurer: SayiKishore Repakula

Member (12-14): Amit Khot

Member (12-14): Shashi Bhatia

Member (12-14): Krishna Murthy

Member (13-15): Arun Pondichery

Member (13-15): Kusum Bhalla

Member (13-15): Pradeep Gupta

Past President: Phani Tej Adidam

402-679-0063

COMMITTEE CHAIRPERSONS

Puja & Religious: Suresh Seshadri

402- 980-2919

Finance: VT Ramakrishnan 402-493-2931

Education: Rajesh Sharma

Cultural: Deepa Kashyap

Mahaprasad: Gowridhar Madu

Facility Maintenance: Srinivas Mallipudi

Publications: Babu Guda

IT Management: Kameswara Rao Myneni &

Temple Tours & Public Relation: Vandana Singh &

Natasha Keshwani

Volunteer and Welcome: Sundara Chokkara

Youth and Community Relation: Alekha Dash

Personnel & Resource Management: Ambika Jayaram

Nomination: Phani Tej Adidam

Vedantic Center of Nebraska: Phani Tej Adidam

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

Chairperson: Prem Arora

Vice Chairperson : Shailendra Saxena

Secretary : Sundara Chokkara

Member (12-14): Ramanathan Narayanan

Member (12-14): Sriram Ravipati

Member (12-14): Jayesh Thakker

Member (13-15): Ram Bishu

Member (13-15): Devendra K. Agarwal

Member (13-15): Naresh Dewan

Fund Raising: Alekha Dash and Ram Bishu

Long Range Planning: Sanjay Singh

Past Chairperson: Shantaram Joshi

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Financial Picture of The Hindu Temple

From 2003-2013

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Eight Hours of Team Work for Making Well Over Thousand Modakas for the Sahasra Modaka Homam/Havan

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Volume 21 Issue 1 Page –14

Volume 21 Issue 2

Volume 21 Issue 1

Volume 22 Issue 4 Volume 21 Issue 1

Volume 21 Issue 2

Hindu Temple

13010 Arbor Street

Omaha, Nebraska 68144

402-697-8546

We are on web

Htom.org

Volume 21 Issue 1

Volume 22 Issue 4

Volunteers Needed

Namaskar,

The temple needs volunteers in the following areas:

In giving temple tours

On special puja days (help with arrangements for pujas)

In ironing deity clothes.

In cooking mahaprasadam on special occasions.

In serving lunch and post lunch cleanup of social hall.

Please respond to htom.volunteers @gmail.com, if you wish to volunteer, so

that we could add your name in our database.

Name:__________________________Email:______________________________

Contact number (best time to reach):_________________________

Mention the area:____________________________________________________

Non-Profit Organization

US Postage Paid

Omaha, NE

Permit Number 1182