About Chitrapur Heritage Foundation

Founded in 2005, the Chitrapur Heritage Foundation embodies a concept that originated a long time ago in the US: a permanent community endowment committed to meet the changing needs of a community as well as provide support for the community’s cultural and heritage preservation.

The dedicated people who founded the Chitrapur Heritage Foundation simply wanted to create a small organization that would garner the support of Chitrapur Saraswats in the US for giving back to our Math and the Chitrapur community. The founding members this new organization are also quite active in their communities - organizing satsangs, managing community support centers, volunteering in charitable organizations, etc.

CHF is registered in the state of New Jersey, USA as a Section 501 (c)(3) not-for-profit charitable organization and donors receive the maximum charitable deduction allowed by law. Furthermore, CHF has set up four regional centers - East, West, North and South - in select cities - Kendall Park, NJ; San Jose, CA; Chicago, IL; and Houston, TX.

CHF is set up to promote Chitrapur Saraswat Heritage by supporting special events such as the forthcoming 2008 Tercentenary Celebrations and traditional activities of Chitrapur Math in India through the collection of Vantiga, and raising funds for sustainable community development activities. In the United States, CHF chapters will also facilitate and support celebration of monthly Satsang, Ugadi, Ram Navami, Dassera / Durga Puja, Diwali and other traditional community functions.

CHF's Mission

The mission of CHF is to actively participate and contribute towards the preservation of the rich cultural heritage and sustainable community development in the village of Chitrapur in the State of Karnataka in India.

How Much Have We Done since CHF inception? Chitrapur Heritage Foundation has awarded more than $125,000 in grants and scholarships since its founding, carrying out the charitable wishes of hundreds of donors. CHF has disbursed $75,000 for cultural preservation efforts, $37,500 for “green energy” projects, and $12,500 for scholarships and for advanced vaidik education.

How Much More Needs to be Done?

Chitrapur Heritage Foundation in their Strategic Fundraising Plan set a goal of raising $750,000 to award grants for community projects. The single largest project is the construction of a state-of-the-art museum to house invaluable artifacts and cultural icons that have been collected by the Math over the past 300 years. With the assistance of the National Archives of the Government of India and the Karnataka Governments, these artifacts are being carefully catalogued and documented for preservation. The architectural firm of Chandavarkars have already prepared renderings of the Museum and a suitable site has been identified. CHF would very much like to invite a major sponsor or a core group of sponsors to come forward and pledge their financial support. It is quite likely that the Math may consider offering the sponsor a plaque that will be permanently built into the museum entrance wall as a token of its appreciation for financial support.

CHF will also support building community social capital by helping set up a vocational technical education centre called Centre for Rural Energy, Arts & Technology for Empowerment (CREATE) will be set up in November 2007 to provide training and business incubation support to the rural youth who wish to receive training and set up micro-enterprises. CREATE aims to provide hands-on training in the areas of biomass energy, biogas anaerobic digesters, solar panel design and fabrication, rural handicrafts, etc. This organization will also provide a forum for exploring opportunities for setting rural-BPOs for urban companies. CREATE will also establish links to markets by entering into strategic partnerships with international non-profit entities to provide retail marketing outlets for artisanal products handcrafted by Samvit Sudha and selfhelp groups set up under Project Parimochan. Strategic partnerships will also be established with community organizations in India for capacity building of the self-help groups in Chitrapur.