By Our Staff Reporter
Dehradun, 30 Mar: Past Governor of Rotary District 3080 Hemant Arora from Roorkee represented the Rotary International President (2021-22) Shekhar Mehta at the District 3110 Conference, “Andaaz”, at Vrindavan on 25-26 March.
Arora, a renowned Chartered Accountant from Roorkee, had been the Governor, Rotary District 3080, in 2002-03. PDG Arora shared and elaborated the theme of President Shekhar Mehta’s “Serve to Change Lives”. The Conference was also attended by the famous and charming film star of her time and Member of Parliament from Mathura Hema Malini. Rotary International Director AS Venkatesh was also present.
District 3110 is a big district consisting of Almora, Chamoli, Nainital, Pantnagar, Kashipur, Rudrapur and Pithoragrah of Uttarakhand and parts of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. The district has 140 clubs and about 4000 Rotarians. The conference, ‘Andaaz’, was well attended by not less than 500 Rotarians to show how they Serve to Change Lives. The Conference was organised under the leadership District Governor Mukesh Singhal, who spoke of his achievements during the year. PDG Arora motivated the Rotarians on how to work and serve to change the lives of others and gave a very motivational speech at the first session and, then again, on the concluding day. He emhasised the need for membership development and challenged the Rotarians to bring one more Rotarian and pay the debt of those persons who have introduced them to the Rotary.
Hema Malini praised the role of Rotary in the area and the social activities it had taken up during the pandemic period. PDG Arora also emphasised the need for women empowerment and to how to bring young girls into the mainstream of society. He gave many examples of this. There were 7 Plenary Sessions besides one Valedictory Session in which many dignitaries including DGDN Vivek Garg and many Past Governors also shared their views. The Accounts of last year were shared by IPDG DC Shukla.
PDG Arora motivated all the Rotarians to contribute to the Rotary Foundation. The highlight of the Conference was the contribution of Rs 250,000 dollars (equivalent of Indian Rs 2 crores) by Nidhipati Singhani to The Rotary Foundation in the presence of PDG Hemant Arora.
President Shekhar Mehta is the fourth Indian who has led the Rotary International. This shows the strength and acceptance of India as a power. The first was the late NItish Laharry, followed by Rajendra K Saboo, known as Raja Saboo from Chandigarh. The third one is Kalyan Banerjee and the fourth is President Shekhar Mehta. This shows how Rotary of India has become powerful and competes with other parts of world. Rotary District 3110 has played a big role in this regard.
In Rotary, every district holds a conference every year where the theme of the President and the achievements of the district are discussed and shared. Since the President cannot attend all conferences the world over, he sends senior Past Governors as his Representatives who he finds capable of sharing his theme of the year. The audience applauded the speech of PDG Arora and the way he expressed his views. Rotary International Director AS Venkatesh also spoke on the occasion.
PDG Arora also highlighted the importance of Vrindavan being a religious city and quoted some historic incidents. His wife Sunita Arora also accompanied him.
