Video Translation:

Today I would be introducing my viewers a dear friend of mine and a well known member of the Silicon Valley, Manohar Mahavadi. Born and brought in India, Manohar completed his masters from Virginia Tech and microwaves communication engineering from IIT Kharagpur.  He has more than 35 years industry experience in various fields in public and private companies, currently he is working as senior vice president in a Bay Area company. Both his children are very well educated and settle down in medicine. His wife Sailaja again a very dear friend of mine, comes from a family in India known for their selfless services to girls education and child welfare. She’s passionate about women empowerment and works for a non-profit organization here in the Bay area. Manohar Mahavadi with the keen understanding of cultural roots of traditional India, added to his rare wisdom to attention to detail is a well respected figure in the Bay Area. He has been a volunteer serving Shiva Vishnu Temple in Livermore in various roles and currently serving as executive Committee chair for youth in education. His passion to learn and understand the greatness of Sanatana Dharma and work with children has pushed him to undertake his new venture called “Global Hindu Teens Conference”. What is this “Hindu Teens Conference”? What is Manohar trying to achieve by this? He says this venture would be an exploration of scientific achievements of Indian History and Culture. Let’s learn more about this in his own words.

Meena : Hello Manohar Garu, first let me thank you for being with us today in addition truly appreciate the time and effort your putting into explore the greatness of Indian Culture. Can you tell us little about what exactly is the purpose of this venture and how you came about it?

Manohar : Namaste Meena Garu, thank you for giving me this opportunity. So I have been in the Silicon Valley for almost 30-35 years and I interacted with children, wherever I go, whichever party I go. I interact with children watching them grow and interacting with them basically to understand what their feelings are or interests in learning about their Hindu heritage or about the country which their parents came from in general? So I noticed one thing, children in their young age, in the elementary school time or middle school time, they follow their parents out of love, out of respect, out of simple may be fear. They go attend temples, attend puja’s and later on as they step into high school and start expanding their horizons, they develop little bit of less interest in that and I am sure due to many reasons they may not be paying much attention to those things. So my goal is to really to create interest in them about the wonderful treasures, wonderful contributions of Hindu society to overall development, peace and prosperity of humanity in general and we come from a land, over generations and generations have enriched their experience through knowledge, through learning, through scriptures, through very positive and scientific way of thinking about the day to day life itself. So my effort here is to create in them that there are lot of contributions of Hindu society to science, technology, mathematics, economics and different astronomy, so there are many examples I can give actually. I can give couple of examples I would like to give here so that they appreciate what society we came from, we have for example we have learnt about Pythagoras theorem in our school days, children are learning today also, it’s always called Pythagoras theorem. Basically squares of the sides you add up it and it will become the square of a diagonal. But Pythagoras was around 400BC if I looked into Wikipedia or any knowledge based it is 400BC but before Pythagoras almost like 500years before Pythagoras there was a mathematician called Baudhayana, who came up with Sulabha Sutram exact in the same thing with a proof and it is in Baudhayana sutra’s books but we never knew that for whatever reason it is we never knew that there were wonderful people. Similarly in astronomy  for example, the heliocentric theory was proposed by Copernicus 15^th century or around that time frame but in 6^th century or 5^th century itself Aryabhata proposed that planets move around the sun and earth moves around the sun which is different than the normal understanding that from the lunar centric or geocentric theory. But we are never mentioned anywhere about any of these contributions, it was always we were learning from the different parts of the world even today in many circles academic circles anything we hear whether it’s about numeral system or number system or contribution zero we always find some other society has contributed but we never even mention the great contributions of Indian society. So it is something sometimes I feel that it is not fair, it is so much knowledge that Indian society has built so much knowledge over periods of time. So many wonderful religions came from that peninsular Indian sub-continent. So it requires its recognition and plus over children were born and brought up in this country especially in North America, their definitely the amount of time they receive or attention they receive to educate our Indian history or passed for Hindu society it’s very little very less. So because what I am today, what we are today is because of our past because of what we learned over generations sub consciously or consciously built into our system. So it is my effort to build interest in children at a young age to understand positive contributions lot of wonderful contributions. For example, Galileo has invented telescope in 15^th century or on that time. But children are never taught and we see the reference to planetary system the reference to lunar eclipse, solar eclipse, when sun and moon rises, when Sri Rama was born in which Nakshatra, which zodiac sign thousands of year back people talked about it people mentioned right?  And we talked about the polar star the Dhruva Nakshatra. So much knowledge has been there but it was never ever acknowledged or mentioned anywhere so my effort is to clearly bring it out and as wonderful now I am glad that there is so much being written by even outsiders other than Indian continent about the contributions of Indian society. So I can give many examples, I want children to really do some research and study the internet and then this is the platform I would like to provide so they can spend some time and create a video clip of 3-6minutes so that they can write in their own words, compile the information, send a submission of that to the temple website and then we will evaluate it and to incentivize them, to motivate them we are also providing about 50 prices.

MEENA : Wonderful! I think everyone globally should take this opportunity , write something I feel this is one of the great ventures. We also thank the temple for coming up and encouraging and doing this for all of us. I sometimes feel one of the reasons could be the British rule as well, that none of this history as come up into life. But well that’s a different topic. Thank you so much and I was wondering how is the response from teenagers, are they excited about the topic, what was the response you are getting?

MANOHAR: Actually I am very impressed. Infact since this I am able to interact with a lot of teenagers now in this premise I am calling them ahead in conference and then after the initial hesitation I give them some examples on what happened and what is the conclusion. They are saying wow we never knew that so we definitely would like to know more about that. So I said them to do search on Google, Yahoo or whatever tools you have now you find enough information. And spend some time in developing interest. So the purpose is they create interest and develop respect for their past they develop pride in them and in future, they will be interested to know more about it. So, if it solves even small percentage of that objective, I will be very happy. Because children need that kind of platform so this is a good response they are getting and there is almost like 200 applications and registrations that came are more than 200 now. And 50% or more are from India, Sri Lanka, Uganda, Malaysia, The Arabic countries and 50% are from USA, UK, Canada, Switzerland, New Zealand. So it is spreading definitely we can do more and we can spread more. But it’s within the limited time what we have it is able to at least get attention from different parts of the world.

MEENA: Excellent, so far mostly the Indian community here is basically looking into dance, music to bring out the culture and this is the new thing that we are bringing out the scientific values for Indian culture and that is really very stunning, extremely new I am very excited about this venture actually. And you are saying this is global and there are lots of registrations from all over the countries. But is it really global which are the countries you got so far. You mentioned some countries but are you getting anything from say east-India or from countries like Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and anywhere else?

MANOHAR: Yes, actually I have the fortune to really interact with some of the representatives from volunteers from different countries. For example, Sri Lanka there is a wonderful volunteer who is contributing from Fiji islands, recently I got connected with them. And then from Uganda there is a wonderful volunteer who is just spreading the message and I already have 6 registrations from Uganda. And there are few from Tanzania, people who wanted to know about their roots, Hindu’s settled in different parts of the world and we have representatives from within India itself from Jammu and Kashmir. And it is very good feeling for me that I am able to at least make some connections with the people who are very eager to know, contribute and encourage their children. So we have representatives from Assam, remote parts of Assam, we have representatives from Qatar and Singapore. And it is spreading. I wish we have more time but this is the first experiment. We would like to make it recurring event so we will get opportunity to give opportunity to next batch of the people also to study more. So yes it is going out in a nice way and I am happy from the response so far from different countries.

MEENA: If you can please explain little bit the process of the registration and I would like to tell the viewers that there are cash prices, there are a lot of contributors here in the Bay Area who have contributed for this purpose. And that shows the interest and Manohar ji has spread the community here. And everybody is excited so, can you please tell us little bit more about the process.

MANOHAR: Sure, So we want to make it as simple process possible because this is going to be a virtual conference and we are from different parts of the world. So first thing they have to do is go to the temple website Shiva Vishnu temple website which is “livermoretemple.org” and register it. By registering we get there email addresses, name, and little bit of more details that’s all, we capture the information and then we will send a mail to them on what they should do. So we will immediately respond with a mail with in 24hours or so, we will send them a mail the steps. What they have to do they have to select a topic from various topics suggestion we provided them on temple website, it is very broad topic you can say. So that children can pick what they like, it could be music, dance, scientific contributions which has very tangible existing proofs. The  fundamental objective and important thing to be noted is when they present this, when they create a video, when they create a write up, they have to mention from which source they got this information. That means they have to do some study and they have to say for example this is from this book, this chapter, this sloka, from this writer or academic professor of MIT who said this. Because it should not be simply a wishful thinking, it should have some validation over period of time, so that they can show some proof and evidence. So they have to create a video, and they have to write up in their own words. Because we don’t want copy and paste from internet, that’s how they develop skills of writing as well I am addressing this to teenagers. This is addressing to the teenagers anywhere from the most develop countries like USA, Canada, Australia to under developed countries like Africa and other places. So we want to give them an opportunity, in the process the children will learn to write a small essay, the children will still in front of the phone and talk about it, they can structure these sentences they can articulate it and submit it. We also made it little bit more liberal saying that after submission if you think that you could have done a better job you can rewrite and resubmit it by February 15. That is a window where we wanted to draw a line because we are giving 1 month time , so they still have time 3 more weeks or 2 more weeks and they can rewrite it resubmit it if they are not satisfied with what they have. And we are also frequently sending them mails, reminding them about the rules for example, their write up should follow a template, basically the template gives it a structure, so it will be easy for the judges to really categorize that. We are also picking judges from different sections of the society for example, evaluating a music video and music write up we will be entrusting this to people who have experience knowledge and familiarity with music. So they can evaluate it better. The other thing is we are also categorizing into 2 categories , children from developed countries like USA, Canada, UK, Switzerland, Australia and children from developing & under developed countries. So that way we will compare apples to apples rather then you know different a child from remote area of Karnataka or Kerala competing with a child from Silicon Valley here in California or Canada. Because we understand there constrains, their limitations, their training so we want to give them a bit of fairness. So we are evaluating different criteria for that. It is not one criteria there are multiple criteria’s. The bottom line is we want to encourage children to participate. So we have given a list of 50 prices. ‘The first price for 5 400$ each’,` 10 second prices 200$ each’ and `35 third prices 100$ each’. So it is basically to motivate, encourage and incentivize children so that they get a good feeling that they get some recognition, some appreciation and for just participating in the conference, submitting the video and write up, we will give them a certificate of participation. So they can definitely feel good about that. The bottom line is we want to encourage them in a very positive way and give them some confidence and build some self esteem and self pride in the heritage which they came from this skill.

Meena: As a person who is from mostly more into music and dancing I have just a small question when you say dance and music what kind of submissions are you expecting? Is it about some history about dance and music? Or is it about a particular poet? Or it can be anything right?

Manohar : It is a very good question actually. Some of the children are asking. How do you evaluate? What do we submit? The fundamental thing is when I see Bharatanatyam, what is it I am gaining? The first thing I will think about it. Is it happiness? There are lot of emotional expressions. How did it come through actually? Who created this?  Then what is the history of that. So what is the tangible value I have derived from that? What is it I can showcase with some proofs? For example, if by doing Bharatanatyam or Kuchipudi, there is a mental and physical balance of our thought process or expressions. What is that it is so delightful? What does it contribute to me as a person? Or as to the society. So they can articulate in their own way and then provide some proof or rather if can justify this. For Example, this particular thing got appreciation from thousands and thousands of people because people benefitted. Showcase some tangible proof. It’s a balance of both, one is what it does to me as a person, second is what it does to society in general. So there’s a combination of things. We make the topic so broad, that children get many doubts. For example, One child questioned I am presenting on yoga, can I put pictures, I said yes sure, but when you put picture of yoga, you should explain why you put it? For Example, if there’s a picture of Shirshasana, what is the benefit of it? What is the benefit on my human body, my health, my memory power, so if you can quantify that, for example by doing Shirshasana for ten minutes every day or every alternate day, doctor’s have found out it will increase the memory power and reduce the blood pressure.  If you can sight an article or some paper published in newspaper, it’s good to quote, that way it is justifying what his feelings are, somebody else validated that, So that is the objective of this effort actually.     

Meena : Actually all this sounds so interesting, I am sure if there are 200 people writing something about Indian culture, is there any way that you can bring this into general public, because  I know you will be judging it and giving presentations but how would people like we able to see this presentations. Is there any way that we can see them?

Manohar : One way which we are thinking is that top 50 presentations can be put on the website with their permission , because one of the thing which we need to be careful is any legal violations or any copyright violations, as an organization we have to be little careful.

Meena : What are the other activities that Shiva Vishnu temple is organizing for youth in education. Briefly if you can please let us know. I am very keen on knowing this actually.

Manohar : Shiva Vishnu Temple I am very proud to be associated, it is one of the oldest temples in US and very well run organization, excellent team of dedicated volunteers. So as a part of youth and education activities, there are very good dedicated team of teachers, who are teaching for example Sanskrit, we have enrollment of about 100 students in Sanskrit classes run weekend. There are passionate teachers teaching robotics, internet of things, debate and public speaking, postmaster’s club and I am very happy and proud to say that the children who are trained in Livermore in weekend classes, they got recognition and international competition and all the credit goes to the wonderful teachers, very passionately they teach. They sincerely believe that we can offer this free service and everything is free. In that past 12 months because of covid everything is virtual, otherwise we have classrooms, children come and in that ambience they get most out of their weekend time.

Meena : Actually wonderful, we should thank people like you and you are the chair of the education committee in the Livermore and congratulations and thank you. How is the response in the Bay Area for the conference? Have people been upcoming and helping you out a little bit.

Manohar : Actually I am very pleased by the response, there are many volunteers who wanted to help, but to make it manageable, we need to limit the number. In the Bay Area, I shall thank you Meena ji for volunteering this also, actually you are helping us, also spreading this message and you have vast following it definitely helps. Like this there are volunteers who own medical facilities, and they are contributing to this and they are attending almost every meeting, there are volunteers who own companies who own tons of money, who are successful entrepreneurs and they are more elder to me. They are willing to spend time and give me guidance and mentor this whole activity. This is an opportunity to thank all of them actually. I am very pleased by the help and guidance I am receiving from different quarters and there are many more people who are willing to volunteer. This is a great platform for all of us to come together.

Meena : If there’s one message you would want to give my readers or viewers what would that be?

Manohar : I would like to request all the parents, please dedicate some time doesn’t need to be a quantum of time every week or anything like that, but  a part of thought process, as we do in our day to day life, we take our children basketball and everything, let us all put some thoughts to inculcate in them some respect for their heritage. One of the things I personally believe is unless you develop respect or liking you don’t want spend time to know more. So parents have to learn little bit, know more about it, because knowledge is infinite, not everyone knows everything, there’s never a time frame to learn anything, it is never late we can always pickup some bits of information and our dharma, our duty is to provide our children a platform, so that they can built on this platform more and more, their later years of their life. So parents should spend some time to pass it on, doesn’t need to be 100% but some part of it, that way they can become complete citizen, not ignoring certain aspects of it, that’s my honest request to every parent actually, whatever we learnt through our heritage pass it onto them.

Meena : Absolutely, that’s a great message. Thank you for being with us. Hopefully this is going to be huge success and looking forward to knowing more about our culture through this venture. Thank you Manohar garu for being with us today.

Manohar : Actually thank you Meena garu for giving this opportunity. I look forward to future interactions as well. We can all work together to general contribution to the society.