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Samanvaya at 21...

Freedom consistently defined our work culture at Samanvaya. We have always been free to pursue whatever we felt was important at a given point in time. Almost always it had to do with social causes, organizations and initiatives and more recently institutions. Looking back to 1998 when we started Samanvaya, I wonder today, whether we had an element of "Patriotism"? or to what extent it was a motivation for us. A honest reply is, "I don't think it mattered", we were  happy to experiment working for social causes through a consulting firm. Yes there was inspiration through reading of Vivekananda and Aurobindo to some extent, Gandhi came much later. But, there was no need to justify ourselves with some form of badge or another when we started, all our knowledge on Indian history, studying of India's past 400 years of historical research, our own research on communities and their strengths and extended work with villages came much later.  When we started,

Indian - Indian Dialogue: When Indians meet

When Indians meet …An Encounter with the Native America Ramasubramanian During Oct-Nov 2018, I visited the USA for 2 weeks.   In addition to delivering a few lectures, I interacted with Indigenous American leaders and thinkers for a dialogue that I call the ‘Indian – Indian Dialogue’. I was trying to understand their world view, current situation, their struggles and how they see the world in the context of today’s climate change crisis. In this article, I highlight some of the salient aspects of the dialogue with the Native Americans whom I got to meet.   This article is informed by my dialogues with native leaders, my own research, and my extensive conversations with my colleague and host, Reverend Sara Jolena Wolcott, Director of Sequoia Samanvaya , who is actively engaging in changing the way Americans see their history. A version of this article was first published in the April 2019 issue of The Vedanta Kesari, monthly Vedantic magazine published by the Ramakrishna