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Raj Melville - Our Social Entrepreneurship Columnist is in India and enjoying Diwali ...

I am in India for Diwali for the first time in nearly thirty years. It is awesome. My family is Christian,  and hence we do not celebrate Diwali .. However we do participate - so we get sweets from all our Hindu friends who come over to wish my dad and family. In the evening the houses on the hill going up to Powai (a suburb in Mumbai, home to IIT Bombay) are all lit up with lights and look like a fairy land. The air around us is filled with fireworks from all the neighborhoods. It is great going up on the terrace - you get a 360 degree view of lights and fireworks - like the 4th of July but going on for hours and all around you :-)

Puran and Kamlesh Dang...

Diwali is the best celebrated festival for my family.The whole family gathers for the Pooja of Lakshmi Mata & Ganesh Ji. We have a small temple in our home where we perform the Pooja by chanting Aartis and giving a bath to the deities in milk and feed them with sweets. Our grand children find it very interesting and amazing! It is a sight to see the way they sit in rapt attention and watch the elders doing Pooja. Their eye is on the Mithai(sweets) though and the moment Pooja is over they briskly make the best of it.
Grand mother has cooked multi-dish delicious dinner which the whole family enjoys.The festival brings family together in the best possible setting.We leave all lights on during the night under the supposition that Mata Lakshmi does visit at night and will bless the lighted home.And leave her blessings of wealth & Prosperity for the family.

Sanjay and Sangeeta Saxena.....

We do Sri Laxmi-Ganesh Puja at home. Alongside, we also do the puja of Deepaks, gold/silver coins, account-books and pen/ink. On Diwali, we also do an annual review of our financial situation and commit to a life of financial discipline.  Diwali puja reinforces the thought that, Mother Laxmi (money is a visible sign of this universal force, is indespensible to the fullness of outer life. She supports the journey of life and its development like a mother nurtures the baby.According to Sri Aurobindo, "The seekers or keepers of wealth are more often possessed (by it) rather than (being) its possessors. All wealth belongs to the Divine and those who hold (it) are its trustees, not (its) possessors. It is with them today, tomorrow it may be elsewhere. All depends on the way they discharge their trust while it is with them, in what spirit, with what consciousness in their use of it, to what purpose."

Neelam and Anupam Wali

Deepawali is one of the oldest rituals for Kashmiri Pundits.. Since we were not used to eating Sweets in Kashmir, we substitute sweets with sweet Puris and offer the same to Lord NARAYAN (incarnation of Lord Vishnu).
We Kashmiri Pundits do not celebrate Diwili with the same gusto as is done by our Hindu brethren outside Kashmir. This could be due to the fact that we are Lord SHIVA worshipers. Diwali is primarily a worship of Lord VISHNU who is very popular in the plains of India.
Today in Billerica I will be make some Sweet Puris, lighting candles on my deck for few hours. After the Pooja I will go to my American neighbors and distribute the Puries that they look forward to every year.

Ishani  and Chandu Shah,  Deval and Rakesh Kamdar,

We always celebrate it together. We have a tradition of doing Satnarayan Katha and Chopda Poojan ( a typical Gujrati ritual) on Diwali Day. The kids also burst some fire crackers and we had a Diwali feast.

Raj Mundra and Students At Phillips Academy

This year Phillips Academy celebrates Divali in many ways.  On Monday
evening, the night before Diwali a number of students came to my house to
cook samosas.  On Tuesday (Diwali day), members of IndoPak dressed in
traditional clothes during the day and during a free period we lit diyas and
gave out the samosas we made to over 100 members of the community.  On
Wednesday, my wife and I hosted a Diwali pooja and dinner and 20 students
attended.  After dinner, the students lead by Rishi Jalan from New Delhi
played a spirited game of Antakshari.  This Friday, the IndoPak club, lead
by co-presidents Aditya Mithal from New York city and Nadine Khan from
Bahrain, will feature the annual Diwali/Eid show.  This program is a highly
anticipated annual event for the community with many South Asian cultural
performances and over 200 people attend.  Prior to the dinner, many day
student families have cooked food and the IndoPak club will sell plates to
the community as a fundraising event.

This is all possible because of the passionate and talented students of
IndoPak.  Retaining cultural traditions, celebrating holidays, eating food,
raising money for South Asian charities and sharing all of this with the
rest of the school community has become a source of pride for the IndoPak
students every year.  The group meets weekly and everyone is welcome into
the club. We always have members who are directly from Pakistan and India,
first generation Americans, as well as students who are just curious and
want to know more about the cultures.

It¹s been my pleasure to support the IndoPak club and see its development
over the years.

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