Author: Gita Bhatia

Karuna Charities’ Twelfth Golf Tournament was successfully held on a cloudy, slightly rainy day at the scenic PB Dye Golf Course in the shadows of the Sugarloaf mountains in Ijamsville, Maryland on Sunday, September 10. This enjoyable event was planned and executed by Ajay Kalotra with help from the Board of Karuna Charities.

The Golfers played with a joie de vivre in a friendly, competitive spirit and then enjoyed the massive gourmet lunch catered by Bombay Tandoor.

The results were announced after the lunch. The winners were handed their trophies. The two very excited first place ladies winners were Jessie Sethie and Savita Malhotra. There was a tie for the Men’s first place–Rippy Singh and Sujan Singh and Bobby Khan and Umar Sadiq. Senior winners were Jigar Shah and Sandy Weininger.

Thank you to all our valuable sponsors:

Platinum Sponsors–Vint and Sigrid Cerf and I.B.T.C.I.

Thank you to all the golfers who made The Karuna Golf experience such a success.

Golfers on their way to the greens.

Getting lined up.

Ajay Kalotra starting the tournament.

Members of the Karuna Charities Board.

Sunday, September 10, 2023

Venue: PB Dye Golf Course IJamsville. MD.
A must-play, beautiful Golf Course!

Enjoy a leisurely, friendly and competitive round of golf while supporting a charitable cause for the needy, vulnerable and the less unfortunate around us.

Players have begun to sign up.

Thank you!

Karuna Charities served a hot Indian meal at the Embry Rucker Homeless Shelter in Reston, VA, April 5th. Seen here in the pictures are Kamlesh Gulati, Kiran Masson, Rama Sharma, Shashi Anand, Sneh Sabharwal, Sujata Avasthi, Amrit Kalotra and Sangita Kalotra. Others who contributed: Rani Varma (Bombay Tandoor), Asha Dhingra and Meena Singh. We served about 100 people and our members cooked and served a dainty dish each!! Once again we all had a happy and satisfying experience.

Lekha Sreenivasan, Chairperson of Karuna Charities International died in Thiruvanthapuram, Kerala, India on Monday, January 9, 2023. Lekha established Karuna Charities Washington, Inc. 25 years ago In Washington DC when her husband T P Sreenivasan, Deputy Indian Ambassador was posted to the US.

Along with her immense love for humanity and ability to organize the Indian community to work for the greater good, Lekha was an artist and dancer.

She had the ability to inspire the expatriate Indian community in Africa, Europe, and North America to willingly serve the needy in their countries of residence and around the world.

She will be deeply missed by her countless friends and members of Karuna Charities Washington.

Our deepest condolences to Mr. T.P. Sreenivasan and family.

On December 9, 2022 Montgomery College hosted a grand luncheon at the Bethesda North Mariott Hotel to honor donors, including Karuna Charities represented by Kanti Singh (Vice-President), Rohini Khera (Ambassador), and Gita Bhatia (Ambassador and Webmaster). Karuna Charities has been donating a scholarship to Montgomery College annually for many years.

And so the story of Karuna Charities continues!! Next year 2023, the Charity will be completing 25 years of Service to our community and we look forward to a great celebration!! We have straddled these years with hard work and commitment! Time passes and now we see that first our Children and now our Grandkids are getting ready to carry forward the baton! The year 2022 concludes with little ones listening to the Karuna Story and contributing towards the $50 gift cards for Thanksgiving to 50 needy kids!! Our collection of money exceeded our expectations!! The Manager of the Shelter was teary eyed as she was presented with the Gift Cards!! Our Cup runneth Full and Over!!

Thank you – thank you and THANK YOU to our community.

Lookout for our activities for next year which will begin with our presentation of $5,000 each to our Endowed Scholarship holders, Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA); University of the District of Columbia (UDC); Montgomery College; and The Universities at Shady Grove.

Karuna Charities wishes you all Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2023!

The year 2021 is coming to a close. Karuna Charities has done its utmost to support the needy in these very critical and trying times. Karuna Charities made an all-out effort to collect funds and was very happy with the response from all of you. In 2020, we had an online Fundraiser with the inimitable Anup Jalota, an online live program from Mumbai and in 2021, we felt bold enough to do an outdoor activity and hence the golf tournament which proved to be very popular. 
We have our goals in force and we did a fabulous Fundraising Drive supported by a very responsive community and gathered funds, always keeping our goals in sight. College education is very important. The needy students needed money for books, food, housing and transportation. We were able to support our four endowed scholarship holders, Montgomery College, Nothern Virginia Community College (NVCC), the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) and The Universities at Shady Grove.
It was and is a very tough time for women and families in shelters, for not only were the shelters full and alternate arrangements had to be made by the managements in nearby hotels and even by putting tents. The vulnerable women faced many unusual challenges. Many stayed home fearful of the pandemic, scarcity of accommodation outside and thus were subjected to unusual and increased amount of abuse.  We worked with individual cases already in the shelters. The Loudoun Abused Women’s Shelter (LAWS) for instance did tremendous amount of work in this area and Karuna Charities was happy to set up an ongoing Karuna fund in the shelter to be dispensed according to the needs of the women. Little things like a change of locks for safety measures, transportation to reach a lawyer, etc., become so significant. Karuna Charities also sent funds to Texas to two organizations for relief work.
Karuna Charities contributed wholeheartedly to food banks, shelters in the DC metropolitan area, and also reached out to COVID affected people in India with much needed medical supplies.  Fresh food was sent to shelters in the hope of bringing some relief to deprived, stressed, and unhappy needy people.
Just as were hoping for some normalcy in these tumultuous times, Omicron has made its appearance! It is a small inconvenience to wear a mask, but it works wonders. Vaccinations have proved to be useful. 
Karuna Charities is grateful to the community for the stouthearted support and thanks all who have contributed so that we can continue serving our community. Do continue to donate in kind or in person for thus we can continue to reach our goals.