About Idli House Council
Idli house council is a group of Youth from the Saraswat Community of India's western coastal ethnicity, connected through the medium of internet community site Orkut. The community utilizes the online medium as a facilitator to unite the youth of the small but far-spread community, through informal gatherings in cities (primarily Mumbai and Pune, India as of now) and innovative activities on the internet (to involve people beyond Mumbai and pune, from all over the world).
Chronological History
It all began with the Gaud Saraswat Brahmin community on Orkut site where most of us are subscribed. We used to have discussions about our community including questions regarding our origin and our customs. Orkut played a major enabler to help youth of the community know more about their roots and to network with each other.
1) The First meet!
The group came into existence when few members of the Gaud Saraswat Brahmin community on orkut decided to meet in mumbai, based on a call from the group moderator Kalpesh Shetye. Kalpesh was keen on meeting active members of the group based in mumbai, during his visit to mumbai from the US. Nagesh Pai, Pravin Da' and his wife Anita Kamath who are among the consistently active members till date were a a part of this meet and coordinated the effort of getting people together to see each other in person for the first time!
The first thread of the meet is right HERE
The first meet had a profound effect, clearly showing how meeting in person creates greater bond and excitement,(reference Sujay Bhat's immediate response after the first meet HERE the reactions here show the effect of how meeting in person makes a big difference)
2) Another significant development happened when more members from the G-S-B yahoo groups got inducted into the Idli house council after Nagesh went on a trek with them to Karnala. He met Abhijit Pai, his sisters Aparna and Anushree, cousin Ananth Pai and close friend Ramesh Mallya. These members, residents of Dombivili (fondly called RoD - Republic of Dombivili by the council) have been contributing a lot ever after the trek which happened in between the first meet and the second.
3) The group decided to meet yet again when Amol Khatkhate our another member wanted to initiate an idea of GSB Scholarships. This time the crowd was small but the desire to have organized meets grew. (Amol's meet thread here.... and the Scholarship scheme thread ) The scholarship idea had some more time before it could take off since our group itself was pretty raw that time. We decided to aid existing schemes across GSB sabhas rather than start something on our own and at a later date when we are more experienced, we may start our own corpus.
4) Finally the day arrived. the group discovered its mecca - The Idli house, which has been engrained into our identity because of its central location (apart from Shivaji park). We had our first meet at Idli house with photographs and detailed blogs posted about our meet. The post event coverage encouraged many more to join with a pure agenda of fun. (since in the past all written agendas turned into fun, the reason being the team was still in formative stages)
5) The meets progressed with many new members joining in few of them as permanent members while the rest as floating members who came off and when. The progress of each of our meets are best documented in our photographs that captured memorable moments for each of the attendees. (photos of all the meets )
6) Apart from regular meets at Idli house and Shivaji Park, we also had treks and outings to places like Elephanta, Sinhagadh, Kondana caves, Duke's nose, Mahuli Village Stargazing... etc.
7) YAHOO MESSENGER CONFERENCES: Roohi Mandrekar Came up with the concept of having live chats rather than passive posts on GSB threads. People agreed to this and we had Yahoo conference over its Instant messenger. Members from within and outside mumbai, from all over the world participated and the bonding with each member grew!
8) The team had its Lion's share of fun and we were at the day where the team felt they must do something beyond. Thats when the team came up with its Vision 2007 which included areas of Career building, Talent nurture and Voluntary service, to name the main ideas. Humble attempts in each of these are underway as per time permitting for each of us. (discussion on Have's and want's )
9) Band and the birth of Radio Idli: Out of the discussions came a desire to have a BAND from Vivek Pai. The idea was very well received. The challenge remained - In a busy city like mumbai, to come together with our instruments and practice on a regular basis.
10) RADIO IDLI was Born in the course of the discussion. It was a solution to keep talent excited straight from the desktop, while keeping the band efforts on. Radio Idli grew the frontiers of Idli House council beyond its stagnating number of 150-odd from within mumbai, to members from all over the world. The concept of Radio Idli was unveiled as a Surprise at an "Audition Meet" at my home. (the Radio Idli meet thread) (Radio Idli birthday photos)
The Radio Idli and the BAND rave continued with its first JAM session at Vivek's house soon after the inaugural meet ( The first official JAM )
(The history will be continued)