Thursday, July 19, 2007

Synopsis of activities of the Ramakrishna Mission, Jaipur

The Ramakrishna Mission, headquartered at Belur, near Kolkata, West Bengal is known the world over for its services to humanity in the spirit of 'service to man as service to God'. During natural disasters, it organizes preliminary food and succor to the affected and at other times, serves the poor and downtrodden with medical aid through its chain of hospitals and dispensaries. Its temples are serving the spiritually starved with its team of dedicated sannyasins.
The Mission is currently engaged in mobilizing funds for expanding the activities of its Centre at Jaipur. Apart from its Charitable Dispensary, it has been running allopathic and homoeopathic out patient services and medical camps free-of-cost for the poor and needy about 30 kms. off the city. In order to build a Universal Temple dedicated to Sri Ramakrishna on its Jaipur Mission premises as well as develop its other welfare activities in the area, the Mission is appealing to one all to come forward and lend a helping hand in the project.
A detailed overview of the work being undertaken at the Centre is as follows:
Medical Work: The Centre annually treats 8,000 patients in its allopathy section and 7,000 patients in the homoeopathic section with the help of eminent doctors volunteering free services.
Mobile Medical Dispensary: The Centre runs a mobile allopathic dispensary every Sunday about 30 kms away from Jaipur in the Jumva-Ramgarh, Jaipur district. Primary treatment with medicine is made available to poor villagers almost free of cost by qualified doctors of the city. Nearly 2,400 patients are thus treated annually.
Drought Relief Work: The Centre organised eight cattle camps in Jodhpur, Barmer and Bikaner districts of Rajasthan a few years back. Shelter, dry fodder, green fodder, cattle-feed, water, in large quantities was provided to the animals. Medical assistance was also provided.
Flood Relief Work in Shiv Tehsil, District Barmer: The flood in Undu Panchayat, Shiv Tehsil, District--due to heavy rains in August'06 had rendered 1 lakh people homeless, displaced and totally dispossessed. This region receives annually 6-7 inches rains; due to 30 inches rain in 2-3 days, the downpour had caused a heavy flooding in this region and water upto 20 feet remained stagnant and stationary there. This is due to the gypsum layer underneath not allowing it to percolate underground. With water all around an artificial winter, sort of, was being felt. People, who have taken shelter under the open sky, urgently needed tent material & blankets. The Ramakrishna Mission, Jaipur after surveying the affected areas, had started its relief work in the above region in order to provide 3,000 families, tarpaulin for 1 tent and 2 blankets per family. In this devastation, nearly 3,000 human lives have been lost and about a lakh of cattle have perished. This relief had been completd by 26th Sep.06 and spent Rs. 9,92,000/-. Rupees nine lakh ninety two thousand only.
Intellectual Dimension: The Centre runs a public Library and Reading Room, including a special children's' section. There are about 7,730 books on various subjects in Hindi, English and Bengali catering to about 500 members. Around 2,300 of them are issued to readers in a year. There are 30 magazines and 8 periodicals in the Reading Room.
Spiritual Dimension: Daily worship is performed in the Shrine Room, bhajans are sung as well as weekly discourses are delivered on every Sunday evening. Also, pravachans are delivered in and around Jaipur from time to time.
Celebrations of birthdays of Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi, Swami Vivekananda and Sri Ramakrishna Dev: Cooked prasad is served to 500-600 devotees on all three occasions. Also, Sri Durga Mahaashtami Puja and Sri Sri Kali Puja are performed and cooked prasad served to all those present.
The need for a Universal temple of Sri Ramakrishna aforementioned has become pressing as the number of devotees, well wishers and friends have increased and the present small shrine hall has become inadequate as it cannot accommodate in excess of 100 devotees. The proposed temple is expected to provide accommodation to 500 visitors/devotees for regular prayers and pravachans, apart from taking the load of devotees for special celebrations
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