I was in India last week and had the opportunity to spend time with my mother, my brother and his family and my niece. Also, attended a 25 year reunion at my high school (Don Bosco) in Chennai. I have not been to India since 2005 and it was great catching up with everyone.

CEI has sponsored a leper colony in 2005 and I visited the same last week. I had heard about the leper colony at an event that was held in Pittsburgh sometime in 2004. Padma Venkatraman is the lady who has setup the program to support leper colonies in India and she has dedicated her life for the past 10 years or so supporting this program and making this a phenomenal success. The reason that I was drawn to support the leper colony two years ago was the two aspects articulated by Padma: (i) The lepers typically did not have a desire to live and this program motivates them to live, (ii) This program does not give the leper a grant instead it provides them a loan and helps them see and achieve success in a short time period. I saw three micro industries that are a big success in the leper colony that I visited this time: (i) Artists (I bought several paintings from them), (ii) Furniture store, (iii) Restaurant (small scale). The lepers seemed happy and motivated and all indicated that being involved in these programs have been a life changing experience for them. I also visited a school for children of lepers that was supported by the funds that CEI gave two years ago. There is an opportunity to CEI to help here with providing computers to the school along with computer based education on a go forward basis.

I got back on Sunday and was happy to see my wife (Neeta) and my kids (Isana & Omisa). Now back to work as usual

Raja