Shas­tri Boodan

The Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha, T&T's largest Hin­du or­gan­i­sa­tion, will be con­cen­trat­ing on build­ing so­cial in­sti­tu­tions over the next decade. So said Sat­narayan Ma­haraj, sec­re­tary gen­er­al of the Ma­ha Sab­ha, when he ad­dressed devo­tees at­tend­ing Go­vard­han Poo­ja, on Sat­ur­day night at the Low­er McBean Hin­du Tem­ple, Cou­va.

Ma­haraj said the lo­cal Hin­du com­mu­ni­ty was un­der­go­ing tremen­dous changes and it was about time the com­mu­ni­ty looked at es­tab­lish­ing or­phan­ages, geri­atric care cen­tres and sim­i­lar bod­ies to meet the needs of its mem­bers. He said for the past 100 years, the Hin­du com­mu­ni­ty had been fo­cus­ing on re­li­gion and ed­u­ca­tion that saw sev­er­al ed­u­ca­tion­al in­sti­tu­tions and more than 400 tem­ples be­ing es­tab­lished.

Ma­haraj said the land, build­ing and mon­ey were al­ready avail­able for the es­tab­lish­ment of a halfway home for bat­tered women in cen­tral Trinidad. He said the Ma­ha Sab­ha was al­so es­tab­lish­ing an or­phan­age on lands ac­quired from a pri­vate in­di­vid­ual. He said care for the el­der­ly must al­so be looked at. Ma­haraj said it was not un­com­mon for gov­ern­men­tal sup­port to es­tab­lish in­sti­tu­tions. He said Hin­duism was on the rise in T&T and the SDMS was ea­ger­ly await­ing the next cen­sus.