Dear friends,

Hope you and your family are doing well during these difficult times. Please let us know if ISW can do anything to help you in any way.

  

For the India Society, one of our biggest efforts this year is the expansion of the India Center. We were writing to give you an update on the progress. 

India Center Construction: 

After “Bhoomi Poojan” ceremony in October, we started full steam ahead on construction. The foundation was poured in December, steel for the building was ordered, and plans and paperwork for building permit were submitted to Town of Shrewsbury. The plan was to start the site work in March. Unfortunately, the pandemic hit us hard, all non-essential commercial construction was halted by orders of the Governor, permits were delayed, and work at ISW came to a screeching halt. 

The Expansion Committee along with general contractor and architect continued to meet on a weekly basis, and the slowdown gave us an opportunity to make improvements, especially in design of the lobby that we have named India Pavilion, but overall construction plans suffered a significant setback. As phase two of reopening has started in Massachusetts, we are happy to inform you that we are back on track for construction. Town of Shrewsbury has issued the building permit. Remodeling of the old lobby is already underway. The steel structure will go up soon and current plans are to have the construction completed by November.

You can see more pictures and drone video of the construction made by our outgoing India Youth Group (IYG) president Raunit Kohli, here 

Fundraising: 

Unfortunately, we have not been able to do much fundraising over last several months. Our plan was to focus our efforts on gala at Mechanics hall in June with a prominent Indian artist, but that has now postponed to at least 2021. Some of you have been extremely generous in their offer of providing us a loan, and we certainly intend to take advantage of that offer. At the same time, to ensure cash flow, we have signed up with DCU for a construction loan. We are hoping to minimize the amount that we have to borrow, and a lot will depend on funds received against our current pledges as well as new pledges we are able to generate. 

We want to thank those of you who have shown great support of the project by making significant pledges. Many of you have made a full payment against your pledge and others are making payments over a three-year period. 

• Many of you have may also know others who are on the fence in terms of making a pledge or increasing your own pledge waiting to see the actual construction started. Please reach out to any one of us and we will be happy to meet with you personally.
• If you have made a pledge, but have not fully paid your pledge, may we request you to make a payment sooner if you can?

Thank you again for your contributions! 

Sincerely,

Ashish Cowlagi, President ISW
Rajiv Dayal, Chair, Expansion Committee
Sanjay Shah, Chair, Fundraising Committee