Welcome ELSA Alums to a year we hoped we would start without COVID…but alas! Any plans to meet in person even in small gatherings have to be put right back in cold storage for a while…

In the last ElsaPost, we had reiterated the Fortis offer to our members, and several of you have been able to take advantage of this. An endorsement from Snimer Sahni, a Delhi ELSA:

‘My husband had to have surgery last month at Fortis Gurgaon, and it wasn't covered by his insurance. So, I asked about the ELSA discount, and got it, amounting to around Rs 13,500! Worth more than twice my life membership fee!’

We are delighted to expand on this with another fantastic offer from the Apollo chain of Healthcare Providers. This offer is currently available in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Navi Mumbai, and Delhi. Thank you to the generous members who have agreed to be the Points of Contact in each of these cities –

• Bangalore: Tanya Mitra
• Chennai: Jyotsna Khanna
• Hyderabad: Shubha Narayan (though Bangalore based)
• Kolkata: Smita Saha
• Mumba: Renu Modi
• New Delhi: Shruti Pushkarna

The details will be ready by the 1st February . Then, please visit the LSR Alumni website –
members section for more information.

COVID Delta or Omicron cannot keep a good gal (or a set of them😂😂) down! What have our ELSAs been up to, whether an ELSA offering, or a City gathering, or just an individual ELSA making awesome discoveries? Read on…

TravElsa put together a fantastic trip to Lepakshi, a place that is culturally and archaeologically significant as it is the location of shrines built during the Vijayanagar Empire (1336–1646). The temples are the location of fantastic mural paintings of those kings.



‘Blame it on the isolated months of the pandemic and successive lockdowns or just the natural enthusiasm of the Elsa community, but the excitement over leaving for Lepakshi, the first TravELSA trip in almost two years, had already reached fever pitch on WA. So, when 17 ElSAs boarded a chartered bus headed for the famous Lepakshi temple, laden with enough snacks for an army battalion and at least one birthday cake, it had all the air of a school picnic.

Accompanied by the redoubtable guides Meera Iyer and Pankaj Modi of Carnelian, a company that specializes in journeys into India’s heritage, we were equipped to feed both mind and body..’ Read on and immerse yourself in that happy outing!

(Contributed by Devika Cariappa; pics courtesy Garveeta Somani)

Mumbai Chapter

The Mumbai ELSA book club met at the bandstand overlooking the sea and sunset. Kalpana Mudaliar reports: They discussed the book ‘Good Omens’ by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. It was a delightful conversation around the book which they had chosen for the fantasy genre. For next month’s genre which was Nobel Prize winner, the members picked the author Abdulrazak Gurnah; they decided to vote for his books and choose the most voted.
 

Hyderabad

Vallery Puri, ELSA from Hyderabad, discovers an unknown but fascinating part of Incredible India. On a return trip to Bangalore, she stopped at a little remote village set amidst green rolling hills in the Salem district of Tamil Nadu – Thamammpatti is a little village of wood carvers where – surprise! almost everyone is educated and have collectively decided to sustain and grow their ancient craft of wood carving…Read on for more on her fascinating discovery…

Vallery herself is a prolific artist (now trying to wrap her head around NFTs😃). In her words, ‘If someone were to ask me what art is, I would say there is no ‘right or ‘real’ answer to that query and one cannot truly or completely answer that question. Is it something that appeals to one’s soul? As an artist, whilst I paint, I feel connected to our Universe. There is this all round feeling of one-ness, of being and yet not. This feeling of lightness of being…

Gurgaon

More than 20 members of Gurgaon ELSAs group met after a gap of 2-3 months on 15th January 2022, in a zoom meeting , beautifully moderated by Rekha Bajpe Aggarwal. In this extremely interesting and relaxed meet we all shared about our challenges and achievements .It was beautiful and impressive learning about each other. This session made us realise the reservoir of talent, skills, achievements, accomplishments and powerhouse of energy and enthusiasm of members of this group. We owe our development to our College and the perseverance with which each member created a place of her own in the society was so inspirational and praiseworthy. Every member had a story of her efforts in achieving success in her life.

This meeting lasted almost for three hours.

Some of the comments after the meeting give a sense of our feelings.“I believe the best way to begin reconnecting humanity’s heart, mind, and soul to nature is for us to share our individual stories.”

“The meeting with kindred spirits was so wonderful yesterday!! It was the Elsa DNA at work!!

After interacting with all you wonderful ladies , it seems that I’ve spent ages with you! The connection of mind and spirit was almost instantaneous…
Loved meeting all of you yesterday and listening to your stories!!”

“What an Amazing & fulfilling session!!!! Tript ho Gaye!!!”

“Love the bonhomie and camaraderie that flows spontaneously in this group. The warmth exuded by everyone was so endearing.

One of the best evenings spent during the pandemic !”
“I really think this group and each and every person in it is amazing!!! What awesome stories we heard today!! Too good!!! Very inspiring!! ”

Contributed by ELSA Saroj Kaushal (1962-65)

Based on feedback from a lot of our members via the survey we ran, the new membership plan is as follows:

• Short-term Membership: The membership will be valid for 3 years from the date of graduation. Free, with a nominal processing fee of Rs 500.
• Lifetime Membership: Is being offered at a reduced fee of Rs 2,500 for a limited period of 3 months starting January 15, 2022 to April 2022.
• The plan for overseas members remains the same.
• Please do share this with other non-member ELSAs you know.

For all membership queries, pl write to members@lsrlaumna.org. Ashima Agarwal and Shivani Sharma will be happy to answer your queries.

Our ELSAs – both alumni, students and the extended networks, have so many interests…and we are in the processing of creating an event calendar to meet as many of these interests and needs as possible. Our first event is on the Republic Day, 26th January 2022, and we are so excited to bring to our global community UstadMa Zila Khan, Sufi Singer and Actor. We hope many of you are able to participate and enjoy the event!

Dr Bulbul Dhar-James, who leads our Events Committee, is working hard at this and we will share a calendar of events for the year in our next ELSAPost. For volunteering and suggestions for events, pl email: events@lsralumna.org

We need help, folks! We need people to lead and be part of several initiatives – Events, Social Media, Website, College-Collab, and several others. Please do email us at ec@lsralumna.org to put your hands up for this! We need more hands on board!

Till the next time,

Team ELSAPost