Page 20 - The Indian EYE 021624

NORTH AMERICAN Newsline FEBRUARY 16, 2024 | The Indian Eye 20

Indian Consulate Hosts Interactive Meeting for

Community Leaders with CG Binaya Pradhan

OUR BUREAU comes feedback from the community.
Heads of several national and
NEW YORK, NY
umbrella organizations were present
he Indian Consulate in New at the meeting and included GOPIO
York hosted a meeting of ma- Chairman Dr. Thomas Abraham and
Tjor community groups from President Lal Motwani, FIA NY/NJ/
Northeast Region of the United States CT President Dr. Avinash Gupta,
to an interactive meeting with the AIA President Gobind Munjal, FIA
new Indian Consul General Binaya Columbus President Sriram Menne-
Srikanth Pradhan at the Indian Con- ni, AIAPCA Founder/Chair Deep
sulate on Friday, February 2nd. Alto- Gupta and FOMA President Dr. Ja-
gether 50 community representatives cob Thomas.
participated from New York, New Consul for Community Affairs
Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, A.K. Vijayakrishnan, who managed
Pennsylvania and Ohio. Organization Deputy Consul General Dr. Varun Jeph and Consul General Binaya Srikanth Pradhan at the the event, gave the vote of thanks.
representatives present at the meet- interactive session with community leaders Other Consuls present at the meeting
ing included the Global Organization were Consul for Trade Manish Kul-
of People of Indian Origin (GOPIO) out; Consulate would like to connect General will come to local Communi- hary, Consul Bijender Kumar (Pass-
and its chapters, Federation of Indi- to University student leaders; suggest- ty events if invited in time; and com- port, OCI and Visa), Consul Shruti
an Associations - FIA (NY, NJ, CT), ed that community should go out and munity can use the ballrooms for state Pandey (Culture) and Head of the
FIA Columbus (Ohio), Association of vote and get involved in local politics; foundation events. Finally, CG Prad- Chancery Vishal Harsh. A network-
Indian America (AIA), Asian Indian Consul General and Deputy Consul han said that the Consulate always wel- ing dinner followed.
American of Central Pennsylvania
(AIACPA), Federation of Malay-
alee Association of North America
(FOMA), Uttar Pradesh association
of America, Tamil Sangam, Telugu As-
sociation of North America (TANA),
Telegu Literary and Cultural Associa-
tion (TLCA), Bihar Jharkhand Asso-
ciation, Oriya Society, Indo American
Press Club, Hindu Center and several
other service organizations including
Team Aid. Heads of many of these
groups were present at the meeting.
The meeting in a conference
room style was started by Deputy
Consul General Dr. Varun Jeph with
welcome remarks, who then intro-
duced Consul General Pradhan. Or-
ganization representatives were given
opportunity to speak on their organi-
zation, any community issue and ways
for cooperation with the Consulate. Indian community organization representatives in the Northeast USA with Consul General Pradhan and other Consulate officials
After hearing from all invitees, CG
responded thanking all community
groups for the tremendous work help-
ing the consulate and their contribu-
tion to improved US-India relations.
CG Pradhan also concluded with
following comments on the Consulate
working closer with the community
groups: If there is a need for a Visa
camp for passport, OCI or other con-
sular services, the Consulate will come
to the community group if there are
enough people in need; Consulate
wants to be connected with Students
coming from India specially in the first
year to help them out; for any emer- The interactive meeting in progress
gencies, the Consulate is there to help

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