India Post News Service
Nate Natesan had a vision & embarked on a mission to raise our consciousness to civic sense and he pursued the journey, which is called SwacchDevalaya or clean temples It was in late 2006 at Sunday Bal-Vihar classes where he was struck by the mess of sandals thrown on the floor carelessly. Without a thought, he started arranging sandals neatly on the floor.
Natesan continued arranging footwear at various sathsangh and temples Thus SwacchDevalaya was launched and the name coined from Swacch Bharat in 2014.
Arranging the sandals by with his own hands for over eight years has enabled him to stand tall at temples and manage a large throng of devotees and ensure devotees keep footwear neatly in rack or numbered bags.
Natesan worked at many temples in Atlanta. He uses social media to promote awareness to nonresident Indians all over USA as well. He attends various events in Atlanta to network and promote awareness. Natesan has earned accolades from the Indian community in Atlanta and from many organizations in USA like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad America (VHPA). VHPA considers Swacch effort worthy of emulation and has published swacch article in their website and are planning to communicate with all temples in USA.
The status and action taken so far are enumerated in www.Swacchdevalaya.org/success story
The photos in the gallery section of the website tell the whole story.
Why is it necessary to address this issue? Civic sense is pretty much a way of life in the western culture. Non-resident Indians are ambassadors of Indian heritage and culture. It is to a large extent lack of civic sense that creates filth in India, resulting in diseases that invariably affect the poor people. When people do not have basic civic sense we cannot expect the politicians and leaders to serve the people with higher standard of integrity.
Yoga is a physical, mental and spiritual practice that originated in India. The great sage Patanjali, considered an authority on yogic sutra, prescribed eight fold steps to finding peace. The first two being yama (abstinences), niyama (observances) for self-discipline. An international day for yoga was declared unanimously by the United Nations General Assembly and is celebrated annually on 21 June since its inception in 2015. Thus we teach yoga to the world but seem not to observe basic civic sense while many other cultures do
While there are organizations & temples that practice discipline, some under supervision and some based on the culture of the organization, what is needed is an organic change in our approach to civic sense in public places.
Western society is good in this respect and the Japanese culture is one of the best. The Japanese concept of 5S (sort, straighten, shine, standardize and sustain) is widely practiced in multinationals corporations around the world to improve safety and efficiency in operation. Most of us do practice cleanliness & orderliness at our homes but fail to do so in public particularly in Indian congregations & places of worship.
We revere the values of Sanatana Dharma, the heritage of our glorious culture and the fact that we all can associate our roots to many saints & rishis, Vedas, vedanta,upanishads, puranas, Bhagavdamand epics like Ramayana & Mahabharata.
We have no dearth of spiritual leaders who have led an exemplary life to inspire ourselves to higher standards. We should revive the inherent greatness in the Indian community. People look for cleanliness & order in Indian gatherings & we deserve better.
People look to community leaders for solutions. Together we can achieve it, just like drops of water becoming an ocean. We can create a tsunami of awareness. Most NRI knows about Swacch Bharat. Natesan wants the same awareness in every NRI all over the world for SwacchDevalaya, the first and easy step towards civic sense consciousness.
About Parasuram “Nate” Natesan, Atlanta, Georgia
Email: natestennis@gmail.com Cell # (678) 372-8581
Short Biography
Nate Natesan is one-man army of swacchaDevalaya or clean temples. Nate born and raised in Mumbai, India immigrated to USA in 1982. After graduating with MBA in Management with finance as major, Nate worked in several multinational companies working as senior business analyst and controller in manufacturing industries.
Nate retired in March 2019 and is devoting more time to follow his vision of SwacchDevalaya and SwacchManasalaya.
In 2006 Nate started arranging footwear carelessly thrown at Bal-Vihar& other sathsangs held in public places. His vision is to raise our consciousness to civic sense. He has retired from work and is pursuing his dreams, which is SwacchDevalaya &SwacchManasalaya
