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I was dreaming for several years before coming to U.S. in 1972, to have a temple and to serve Lord Krishna and Lord Shiva. Every night I was thinking about different Gods and a temple Somehow Lord sent me to Raleigh, where there is no temple. The Hindus of this area were not even thinking of a temple. As a son of a Hindu Priest with religious background I started Satyanarayan pooja at my house and observed Lord Krishna's birthday at N.C. State's student center on Janmasthmi celebration. My father was a priest in India at Radha Krishna temple, so I have a special place in my heart for Lord Krishna. Gradually my Indian friends started to attend my religious functions. At the end of two years I formed a Geeta group. In this group we were discussing different interpretations of Geeta slokas. The friends who took part in the discussion were Dr. M. M Sawhney, Dr.B.S. Gupta, Dr.Arvind Shah and several others. After a while other friends also showing interest in Satyanarayan katha, Shiva ratri & Basant Panchami ect. So we started observing these festivals at different places as Community halls of Apartment complexes and also other buildings of N.C. State University, By 1976 Indian community grew up and some prominent members met in the basement of my house to formalize the group. They gave a new name The Hindu Society of North Carolina. Later on they also made a constitution of the Society. At that time the Board of Directors were coming from different parts of the State as Greensboro, Lumberton, Durham etc. The membership dues were $2.00 per family per year..Due to the influx of Indian people we thought to buy our own building. So in 1980 we bought a place to house this Society at Ashe Avenue Raleigh We did not have any funds to buy this place so Board of Directors have to give guarantee to pay the mortgage. The names of these Directors will remain in the history of the Society. There were about 150 families enrolled as members. Every year more Indians were pouring in ,so we thought to have a bigger hall.Somehow Dr. Arvind Shah found six acres of land in the heart of Triangle area at a reasonable price, so we grabbed it. After two years when its mortgage was paid, .. The construction of this temple began. It opened on 20th Dec. 1986. We have to find guarantors. Most of the Board of Directors agreed still bank wanted one more. By Lord's Blessings one member outside of the Board came forward. It was a very happy occasion' The design and layout of this temple was done by Dr. Devendra Sharma, a Physician at Smithfield, N.C. He spent lots of time to make it happen. The membership dues were only $30 dollars per family per year and number of members was about 400.I was only priest in the temple for so many years my wife Saroj Sharma helped me a lot. She spent most of the morning in the temple. Without her help I could not do this work Then she also became President of the Society several times. About this time Indian family started pouring in the Triangle area. Most of the 50% people of community were keeping their traditions and religious
Sanskars. Before constructing the new house they were doing Bhooming pooja later on house entering pooja. It looks that Hindu religion has taken roots in this area. What I was thinking 20 or 25 years ago has changed. Many new face we seen in the temple. This forced us to hire a priest. I was working as a volunteer priest and still continuing. Right now the membership of the society is about 900,and dues are $60 per family per year. The life membership is 500dollars. This increase in numbers of people led us to think to have another hall for community needs so in 2002 we got this new hall It remains busy most of the time performing weddings, birthday parties, thread ceremony ect. This hall can accommodate about 1400 people. The special feature of this hall is that it holds Gurkulul classes, Slokas class's language and dance classes for about 250 students every Sunday morning. I have my blessings with the Society.. This Society is a living entity because it is growing. It started without any land, first it got one and half acres, then six acres and now it has 14 acres and three temporary homes.. I wish that it should keep on growing.
-G. D. Sharma
