Jain Center Minnesota MN 2007 07 Pratishtha

Author(s): Jain Center Minnesota USA
Publisher: USA Jain Center Minnesota

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Report from the Pratishtha Committee
The mission for the Pratishtha Committee was to organize all the efforts that will lead to a successful Pratishtha Mahotsav for the Jain Mandir at the Hindu Mandir. The dates for the Pratishtha Mahotsav are July 20-22, 2007. The JCM Executive committee selected Dilip Desai and Bharat Kothari to lead the Pratishtha Committee.
The committee received the guidance and blessings from Gurudev Chitrabhanuji and Jinchandraji Maharaj (Bandhu Triputhi) for number of murtis, sizes, and Tirthankar decisions. Under the supervision and guidance from Jinchandraji Maharaj, three murtis were acquired from Jaipur, India and they are awesome.
The committee also consulted with key members of the St. Louis Jain Sangh to understand the "dos and don'ts" for planning such a Mahotsav. We are indebted to the St. Louis Sangh for their great advice. We appreciate the guidance received from Mr. Kamal Shah, President of Jain Religion Center of Wisconsin..
The Pratishtha Committee researched the committees selected by the other Jain Sanghs for their Pratishtha Mahotsavs. Based on this research, the Committee decided to form 11 committees. Appeals were sent to the Jain Community to seek volunteers for the committees. Several members from the Jain Community have enthusiastically volunteered their services. The committees and their leads are:
• Audio/Video Production (Utpal Shah) • Communications (Shanti Shah)
• Cultural (Shalini Jain and Tejal Shah)
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Finance (Rajeev Jain)
• Food (Sonali Sanghani)
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Fund Raising (Ram Gada/Pankaj Jain)
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• Reception (Anand Doshi)
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HSMN Liaison (Ram Gada)
Puja and Rituals (Dharmesh Shah)
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The Pratishtha Committee prepared objectives and detailed tasks for each of the above committees. Each committee presented its plan and budget to the Pratishtha committee for fine-tuning and overall synchronization. All the committees have started working very hard and executing their plans. More volunteers from the Twin City community are expected to support the efforts of the above committees.
Sadhu/Monk Care (Ishwarbhai Bhakta)
Souvenir (Neena Gada)
Parallel to these committee efforts, a few individuals of the Pratishtha committee took the responsibility for the Jain Temple architectural design. Mr. Nipulbhai Shah of San Diego volunteered his services to prepare initial sketches for the exterior architecture of the Jain Temple. Nipulbhai has designed several Jain and Hindu temples in USA. The sketches were shared with Padmashree Muthiah, the HSMN architect, and the work was started for the Shikhar and front of the Jain Temple. Subsequently, a recent arrival and an architectural engineer, Rajpal Jain, volunteered his services to design three walls and interior of the Jain temple. The Pratishtha committee thanks Nipulbhai Shah and Rajpal Jain for their creative architectural help and Dilip Desai and Rambhai Gada for overall coordination of this endeavor.
The Pratishtha committee also thanks all the leads and members of all committees for their dedicated and energetic work and appreciates their great teamwork. The Pratishtha committee feels extremely confident that with the grace of all Tirthankars, blessings from Gurudev Chitrabhanuji, and Jinchandraji Maharaj, and hard work from all the volunteers, the Pratishtha Mahotsav will be a grand success.