Diwali Recognition Speech

———————————–
Event: Kc Group's Diwali Dhamaka 2007
Location: Mississauga


Thank you very much and I am grateful and touched with your kindness and for the honour.

Let me use this opportunity to share my thoughts and experiences of last twelve years of my being in Canada.

First: It is the best time to be an Indian professional in the western world. We are most suited to excel in the world of globalization and knowledge economy. What is critical that we maintain our core Indian values- of valuing higher education, conservative life style, value of trusting relationship and willingness to work very hard as just being smart is not enough and finally don’t get caught-up with the entitlement mentality. All the said Indianness needs to be wrapped with western professionalism and tools of higher productivity  and you have all the necessary ingredients and recipe for a massive success that would have been otherwise extremely taxing and massively difficult to achieve in India.

Second: Let us gratefully acknowledge that all of us have done very well in Canada and we live in the most civil and decent part of the world. It is our obligation to start thinking of giving back to the MAINSTREAM causes over and above the ethnic causes we are naturally gravitated to support. All of us are providing mainstream services to the mainstream people in our professional world. We are not ethnic people with ethnic skill sets serving ethnic population. If it is so then majority of our giving should be to the mainstream causes. Herbert Simon, the Nobel Laureate said that 90% of the wealth one accumulates in western societies is because of the social circumstances. Think for a moment- if we were in Liberia or Ethiopia or someone like me stayed back in Bihar- would we have done so well and acquired the skill-set that we have and are rewarded for. Therefore, I urge you to seriously think of giving back to the mainstream causes that you are passionate about and try to be active with the causes you give for. It will benefit us tremendously, benefit Canada deservingly and feed our soul well. May
I urge you to consider giving every year 10% of what you earn after tax? It is highly doable. We never have enough to spare to give but we can always spare to give. Giving is permanent but accumulation is not. Giving is the right thing to do- it is an obligation.

With these thoughts, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Be well and do good.

Aditya Jha
Toronto

Leave Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *