I wrote an email to all those who participated in the meeting thanking them for their presence and their contributions.My email message and reactions, suggestions received from many of them are given below. One of the many high points during this emotion filled virtual meeting, like last time, were the songs by Dr Hemendra Joshi. There was a surprise too. Participation by Dr. GB Shukla.
Thank you so much for your time and for contributing to the interactions ( बतकही, बतकुच्चन ऐंड कुछ नोंकझोंक) at the “2nd Virtual Vrikshamandir Zoom Baithak” held on 6th September 2021 at 700 am and 730 pm ( India Time).
We missed many of you who had shown interest to join.
– Shekar Roy had sent me a message a day earlier and shared the sad news of death of his daughters mother in law and regretting his inability to join. May she get Sadgati.
We also got the sad news of passing away of Shri Kailash Vyas firmer MD Amul and Mrs Nair. Our condolences to the bereaved families.
– Rajan messaged to say earlier in the day to inform that a relative of his was hospitalised and that he needs go and attend and would not join.
-MK Sinha called on whatsapp while the meeting was going on. He was not feeling well so excused himself from joining. We all wished him and hope that he gets well soon and is ready to join the “3rd Virtual Vrikshamandir Baithak” after a fortnight.
After that there was no news from him despite my repeated calls and messages. I am glad to inform you that I spoke to him earlier today. He has moved from Haridwar to Noida and is staying with his son Shishir. He feels a little weak but was in good form and we had good “old men talk” ( Added 10 September )
– Siddiqui too sent several messages about the difficulty in connecting but despite sending him link again things did not work out.
– Mrs Manchanda messaged me after the meeting was over and regretted her inability to join due to health issues.
– SBS Senmazumdar joined but we could neither see not hear him. He later called me on WhatsApp saying he saw all of us and also heard a part of our conversations. He made comments on my beard. (अच्छा नहीं लग रहा काट दीजिये नहीं तो ट्रिम करवा लीजिये। मोदी जी से कंपिटीशन मत करिये” ! ) I accepted the advice that I have been receiving from my wife, sisters and children and after Mazumdar’s “counselling” this time and I got my beard trimmed.
You might notice another gentleman in the picture on your left. He is a friend who lives close to our house. A friend whose ancestors originally migrated from India to British Guiana. He moved to Canada at the age of 18. Sitaram ji is a devout Hindu and has a murti of Bhagwan Shiv at the entrance of his house. He was looking for a rudraksh and I am glad that I found and gave him one rudraksh out of the three that my father had given me.
The next day when I met him I found that he had put the Rudraksh in the middle of the mala of beads around his neck. I could not resist but ask him for a picture and he agreedd.
He does not know from where his ancestors came from India to British Guina but has been going to India and travelled to Varanasi, Prayag, Ayodhya, Haridwar etc. I propose to write a separate blog on my friend Sita Ram. ( Added 10 September)
I have not heard from others who wanted to join but could not do so for whatever reason.
I need apologise for the inconvenience caused to some of you for the difficulty in connecting due to my error in sending link and password etc. .
Internet connectivity, other commitments and the confusion I caused in sending confusing messages and link for the second meeting have been the major causes that came in the way of many of you joining the meeting.
My apologies again. I have learnt a lesson and going forward would be careful.
We had 9 participants each at the two meetings including some who attended both the meetings.
I am not disappointed at the small number who joined at the meeting as I had stated during the first meeting the principle guiding these Virtual Zoom Baithaks are;
– Whosoever show up for the meeting are the right persons
– When the meeting starts is the right time
– When tge meeting ends it ends
And if something good and concrete comes out of it as a result of such interactions It is Gods Gift 🎁
Therefore, I have no regrets and with a deep sense of gratitude thank the “divinity” that resides in each of us ( those who participated as well as those who could not make it) for the opportunity that I got to be of service as a Sutradhar to bring my former colleagues whose “young lives” mattered and who contributed in their own ways in making NDDB of the yore achieve many its objectives.
I would be grateful for your comments, suggestions and most importantly your feelings after attending the meeting. I would like to do a blog by collating your inputs and upload it on Vrikshamandir.
Looking forward to hearing from you,
Warm regards,
Shailendra
PS: As suggested by Kishore Motwani I am not sending this mail to you as bcc but addressing each of you so that you all have each other’s emails. I am marking bcc copies to 11 others who had indicated their desire to join but could not and also not sent any message.
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Dear Shailendra Sir,
Thank you for your emails with slides and innovation list .
I was wondering whether it is ok to add following two to the list
1. Encouraging and assisting HMT to set up dairy machinery manufacturing facility and subsequently IDMC as a wholly owned subsidiary of NDDB- with a view to break the monopoly of milti-nationals in dairy equipment and machinery which was required visualising the growing demand of the dairy industry
2. Initiating reforms in cooperative legislation- A model coop Act (drafting and assisting the planning commission’s committee; partnering with cooperative development foundation (CDF) and assisting a panel of Eminent cooperators including Dr. Kurien. With this initiative AP Govt was the first to enact a parallel legislation for self reliant cooperatives (over10000 coops in AP are under this Act.
Dr. Kurien also envisioned a level playing field with other corporates for coops and articulated in several forums about the need for bringing about the powers of RCS on par with those of Registrar of Companies and had also proposed to the Govt amendment to Companies Act providing incorporation and regulation of Cooperative Companies. But this became a reality only much later (2002) with Producer Companies legislation becoming a part of Companies Act
Best regards
Belavadi
Dr Belavadi,
Yes please we need add, delete, modify the list. As I said the list is not “cast in stone”. Also we all are getting old and memory loss is natural. Though in some cases ( like my father) he would remember his past so clearly but not the present. Towards the end he would not even recognise me. He had Alzheimer’s.
In my case at 75 I notice that I forget details of many incidents of the past but if some one gives a hint I remember.
Both the points you mention are important and noteworthy.
Unfortunately the last meeting due to various reasons did not go as expected. Dr Naware and I had planned to spend more time discussing the list that is why in the slides I inserted blanks to take nots but did not get to that important task and it remained blank 😁🙏🏼
May be in the next meet we focus on the list. Rajan too has suggested some additions.
Marking a copy to Dr Naware to keep him in the loop.
Warm regards,
Shailendra
Thank you very much Shailendra Sir. It is so nice to see the passion with which you have taken up this initiative. Would it be possible to share/email the slides you have prepared? If I understood correctly, you would be putting together anecdotes/important and interesting incidents of the period -1965 to 1998. Best regards Belavadi
Dr. Belavadi,
Yes, I think by keeping the timeline for collecting important and interesting incidents / anecdotes as 1965-1998 we would cover the period Dr Kurien was at the helm of affairs at NDDB.
I am attaching the PowerPoint slides that I shared in the meetings of 6 September. I am marking a copy of this mail to all others who participated in the 6 September Zoom meetings so that they too are privy to our conversation and get the power point slides. I am also sharing the list of 50 innovations that Dr Naware put together some years ago.
As of now I am not sure about final shape of the stories and anecdotes that get collected would be available for people other than us to see. I keep fingers crossed and hope that we come out with something worthwhile.
I would rather wait and how many and what quality of stories and anecdotes we finally get. I will take a call in consultation with the group that has volunteered to be a part of this initiative.
Shailendra
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Sh. SK,
Following innovation may be added, if deemed fit:
1. Selling of Blended Vegetable Oils.
2. Sale of Vegetable oils in TetraPack weight basis.
SCM
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Our ARD lab at NDDB had also developed,
1. choclate bricks for milch animals —— name Minimole ( by late Dr. George kunju )
2. Mumra chikki (Natraj Murthi ) which was a supplement for the weaker section marketed through Ttribhuvandas Foundation ooutreach project.
I am not sure if any of these products developed by erstwhile NDDB colleagues find any place or recognition or mention in today’s NDDB
Thank you.
Rajan G
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Shailendra sir
As always both the meetings were great. It was nice to see Prusti saab & Dr Motwani after ages. Dr Nawre Saab’s presentation was precise & he explained subtly about NDDB innovation.
I would volunteer for writing anecdotes pertaining to implementation of OF 2 in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra.
There are some stories about Board meeting of Baroda Dairy where I represented NDDB . Probably these stories are post Kurien Saab’s tenure.
I may not be off target stating that NDDB’ s Women Dairy Leadership Programme was a sort of innovation particularly in a male dominated society in rural India. The programme was initiated when Dr Kurien saab was NDDB Chairman. I have anecdote pertaining to this programme which occurrd during my promotion interview. I will share it at appropriate time.
Dr Joshi’s melodious voice gave positive impetus to the zoom meeting.
Looking forward for next meeting.
Regards
Arun
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Dear Sir,
It was quite interesting to attend the second Zoom meeting !
My feedback on 2nd Zoom meeting held on 6th September,2021 as follows:
1.Such meeting is really served as boon to people who have been faded up from the screen of mind ,a beautiful recollection and reminiscences are quite nostalgic n how abruptly a lesser known face becomes intimate that was happened in case of Dr Motwani and Sri Nagar saheb !it was quite delightful to listen their dilogues initially looming with question marks n suddenly their expression changed !
2.sinusore of all eyes was the wonderful presentation made by shri Shailendra Kumar ji,how nicely depicted 50 innovations of NDDB authored by Dr Naware..you have nicely underlined the interesting short anecdote write from the innovation such as Development of Amul pattern three tire cooperative system ,depicting the end result of socio economic development of people n improving their living standard !
3.More technical stuff and prolonged discussion over leads to monotony ,it could be made interesting by presently precisely no need to support with data,how it helped is very important what I personally believe!
4.some sense of humour in between would generate more interest how the meeting proceeds while focusing on the agenda.I had note and pen to write down some points so that we could have references for future meeting.
5.I think we all should try through various sources in a joint effort to inform and acquaint our former NDDB employees to join such meeting to have better attendance to sustain interest besides better outcome.
6.I really appreciate shri SK ji for his endeavour about formidable task he is undertaking of making all procedural arrangements with lightening communication with each of us ! At the same time publishing it in the blog ,Vrikshamandir in a beautiful format thus doing commendable work for all of us !Sir ,hats off !
Thanks n regards
Hemendra Joshi
I could not get the connection. However I shall join on the next/ third oneWith kind regards. BG. Pai
Since a complete list of fifty innovative ideas is circulated it is likely that there would be fewer suggestions now although we are open for them. Accordingly in the forthcoming meeting the second section of technological innovative ideas may be discussed. That should be followed by section three and four.
After discussion over all four sections let us work out a list of those ideas on which we can develop articles. If necessary two three innovative ideas could be brought under one title.
This way let us generate a list and call it ‘ Table of Contents ‘ for publication.
By that time let the participants come forward individually or jointly who would like to write a particular article.
The subjects not chosen by anybody could be assigned to somebody by exploring possibility.
All the articles may be written in next say two/three months.
We will need few editors to go through and edit them. Editors could be writers also.
As we progress in future let us discuss the way in which articles could be published whether on line or in hard copy form through any publisher.
Mukund Naware
