RC Dharwad turns 80
I am happy to see that your club is working on projects that are close to my heart. My focus is on empowering girls and ensuring they have access to education, resources, services, and opportunities so that they have the tools they need to thrive. I am happy to be a part of this meaningful celebration,” said RI President Shekhar Mehta, participating in the 80th charter celebrations of RC Dharwad, RID 3170, along with RI Director Mahesh Kotbagi. Mehta interacted with 26 girls whose education are to be sponsored by the club as part of their milestone year commemoration. The club will pay the school fees, and provide uniforms, school bags, shoes and stationery kits to these girls until they finish higher secondary education, said club president Vijaykumar Kattimani.
Kotbagi inducted five new members to the 60-member strong club and felicitated the Major Donors and others who made generous donations to TRF.
Kattimani donated an acre of land for the construction of a new campus for the Paul Harris Memorial Rotary English Medium School run by the club since 1982. It has 492 students now. The club will also be transforming the Government Higher Primary School into a Happy School during the year.
Thanking the club president for his “timely and valuable gift of land,” PDG Ravi Deshpande, chairman of the Paul Harris Memorial School said, “We started this school with a hope to provide quality education to underprivileged children and make them stand at par with private school students. Today our school with state-of-the-art classrooms, qualified teaching and non-teaching staff, and other facilities is one of the best schools in Dharwad with admissions open to everyone. You cannot tell a poor student from the rest of the students and we are proud of this achievement.”
DG Gaurish Dhond lauded the club for its various humanitarian projects.
RC Dharwad, sponsored by RC Bangalore in 1940, is the first club to be chartered in RID 3170, and the second in Karnataka. It has sponsored 11 Rotary, 12 Interact clubs and one Probus club so far. Some of its noteworthy projects include setting up a patient’s ward, neonatal ICU, and drinking water storage tank facility at the Civil Hospital, Dharwad; upgrading the maternity ward at the corporation hospital; expanding infrastructure in crematoriums in and around Dharwad; providing an X-ray machine for the Lourdes Hospital; and providing borewells, drinking water facilities, furniture and computers to schools; The club plans to set up a breastfeeding centre at a bus terminus in the town.
Immediate past president A C Tahshildar was the chairman of the event and PDG Dr Rajan Deshpande and PDG Ravi N Deshpande were the conveners.
