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Keynote Speakers
(Addressing Via Video Conference)
76 JAINA Convention 2015
Narendra Modi was born (1950) in Vadnagar, a small town in North Gujarat's Mehsana district. Modi comes from a family of humble origins and modest means. His parents Damodardas and Hiraba Modi along with entire family lived in a small single story house which was about 40 by 12 feet. Though an average students in school, Modi was known as at strong debater. In 1987, Narendra Modi joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) a Hindu nationalist party. His rise through the ranks was rapid, as he wisely chose mentors to further his
career.
In 1995, Modi was elected BJP national secretary. He became Chief Minister of Gujarat in 2001. He was re-elected as chief minister of Gujarat in 2007 and 2012. He is credited with bringing prosperity and development to Gujarat and is seen as a corrupt-free and efficient administrator.
As a leader of BJP's 2014 election campaign Modi campaigned hard, portraying himself as a pragmatic candidate capable of turning around India's economy. In May 2014, he and his party were victorious, with clear majority after 30 years. He just completed his first year as prime minister of India.
John Robert Lewis was born outside of Troy, Alabama, in 1940. He had a happy childhood, though he needed to work hard to assist his sharecropper parents. He was bothered with the unfaimess of segregation. Hearing Martin Luther King Jr.'s sermons and 1955 Montgomery bus boycott inspired Lewis to act for the changes he wanted to see.
At the American Baptist Theological Seminary he learned about nonviolent protest and helped organize sit-ins at segregated lunch counters. He was arrested during these demonstrations, but undeterred he participated in the Freedom Rides of 1961.
As one of the "Big Six' leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, he helped plan the March on Washington in 1963. Lewis delivered a powerful oration that declared, "We all recognize the fact that if any radical social, political and economic changes are to take place in our society, the people, the masses, must bring them about." Passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, however, this did not make it easier for African Americans to vote in the South. To bring attention to this struggle, Lewis and Hosea Williams led a march from Selma, Alabama, on March 7, 1965. After crossing the Edmund Bridge, the marchers were attacked, Lewis suffered a fractured skull. Images of violent attacks proved too powerful to ignore. "Bloody Sunday," as the day was labeled, sped up the passage of 1965's Voting Rights Act.
In 1981, he won a seat on the Atlanta City Council and in 1986, he was elected to the House of Representatives, representing Georgia's
5th District.
Keynote Speakers
Nipun Mehta is the founder of ServiceSpace, an incubator of projects that works at the intersection of volunteerism, technology and gift-economy. What started as an experiment with four friends in the Silicon Valley has now grown to a global ecosystem of over 400,000 members that has delivered millions of dollars in service for free. Nipun has received many awards, including the Jefferson Award for Public Service, the President's Volunteer Service Award and Wavy Gravy's Humanitarian award.
Nipun's high-school goal was to either become a tennis-pro or a Himalayan Yogi. Dissatisfied by the dot-com greed of the late 90s, Nipun went to a homeless shelter with three friends to "give with absolutely no strings attached. Over the years, they started incubating a diverse set of projects that included online portals DailyGood and Karma Tube, offline movements like Smile Cards, a pay-it-forward rickshaw in India, and Karma Kitchen restaurants in three cities across the US. In 2001, at the age of 25, Nipun quit his job to become a "full time volunteer." He didn't have a plan of survival beyond six months, but so far, so good.
In January 2005, Nipun and Guri, his wife of six months, put everything aside to embark on an open-ended, unscripted walking pilgrimage in India, to "use our hands to do random acts of kindness, our heads to profile inspiring people, and our hearts to cultivate truth." Living on a dollar a day, eating wherever food was offered, sleeping wherever a flat surface was found, and the couple walked 1000 kilometers before ending up at a retreat center, where they meditated for three months. Today, both Nipun and Guri live in Berkeley and stay rooted in a practice of small acts of service. The journey continues. Nipun's mission statement in life now reads: "Bring smiles in the world and stillness in my heart."
Andrew Young Jr., was born (1932) in New Orleans, Louisiana. He comes from a middle-class family, father a dentist, and mother a teacher-he had to travel from his neighborhood to attend segregated schools. After graduating in 1955, he became an ordained minister. Later he joined the Civil Rights Movement, working with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Young was the first African-American ambassador to the United Nations and became mayor of Atlanta. In 1981, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Young coordinated desegregation efforts throughout the South. In 1964, Young became the SCLC's executive director. While in this position, he helped draw up the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He was with King in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968, the day of King's assassination. Following King's death, Young became executive vice president of the SCLC Young has written two books about his role in the fight for civil rights: A Way Out of No Way (1994) and An Easy Burden: The Civil Rights Movement and the Transformation of America (1996). He continues to fight for equality and economic justice.
Jainism: World of Non-Violence 77
