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Address by

Rt.Wor.District Grand Master Rt. Wor.Bro.K.R.N. MENON

at the Inauguration of the CORNWALLIS HOME

6^TH DECEMBER 2006

MOST WOR. BRO. LORD CORNWALLIS, LADY CORNWALLIS, RT. WOR. D.G.M. OF BENGAL, RT. WOR. DORAB BAJAN, R.W.D.G.M. OF BOMBAY AND NORTHERN INDIA, MY BRETHREN AND THEIR LADIES ALL, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN

We are gathered here today to dedicate THE Cornwallis Home – a facility for assisted living for Senior Citizens, for which our Guest of Honour M.W. Bro. Fiennes Lord Cornwallis laid the foundation stone eight years ago and who very graciously agreed to lend his name to it. At that time His Lordship made us a promise that he would return to inaugurate this facility which as you can see he has honoured. We welcome him and Lady Stephanie to this gathering and thank them both for taking the timer and trouble to be here with us on this great occasion.

Before I move into the main part of my address to this gathering, I think it may be necessary to say a few words about the Masonic fraternity, for the benefit of those present here, who are not familiar with our Brotherhood, and what it stands for.

Let us perhaps start with what it is not - it is not a Secret Society, although it’s a Society with some secrets, which really are restricted to the modes of recognition we employ to identify each other. Another secret if you like is our commitment to Benevolence and Charity which we generally do not advertise, nor do we generally approach the public for donations. The fraternity’s prime objective however is Charity, and contribute at every meeting to the general cause of Charity, and we have funds set apart purely for these purposes. We are not a Religion but respect all Religions, from which we distil the moral precepts which are then illustrated by Masonic symbols. In fact one cannot join our fraternity without a specific avowal in a belief in God. We are forbidden from discussing matters relating to religion or to Politics, so we are not a Political Group.

Historically speaking, we have been an organized body practising these virtues since about the 1700s, from which time we have also been in India in an unbroken continuum, to this day. During times when there was no social security net for citizens or even for soldiers, Freemasonry provided, and continues to provide a support system for its Members, and for the Public, whenever possible. This Home named after one of our most illustrious Members, M.W. Bro. Fiennes Lord Cornwallis, is a symbol of that commitment to our society, and exhibits our newly minted open-ness, so that the public can see our good work and disabuse their minds of the mysterious notions about our association. Our Grand Master is HRH Most. Wor. Bro. The Duke of Kent who has been leading us for the past more than two decades in this position, and whose message to me you have just heard read.

Returning to the Home Project while we had numerous difficulties in executing this project, mainly to do with procedural and statutory matters, not to mention the need to raise the required to complete it, there was always at the back of our minds the obligation we had from our side, to honour Lord Cornwallis’ commitment to this project. In fact, on one occasion His Lordship is said to have told a friend of mine in England, also a Mason who said he knew me, to convey to me his anxiety to see this Home getting off the ground. The reminder was a further goad to our efforts, and so about two years ago we decided it was time to step on the gas after the procedural road-blocks were removed in which work, we have some of the Brethren of our local Lodge, Southern Brotherhood to thank led by Wor. Bros. Kirit Morzaria and Thomas Thomas.

I shall now return to the beginnings of this project idea, of having a residential facility for our Elders – an idea mooted by my predecessor R.W. Bro. A.P. Tampi’s administration, with the late Wor. Bro. T.A. Devagnanam lending his zeal to the idea, and becoming the first Patron with a donation of Rs.3 Lakhs, almost two decades ago. R.W. Bro. A.P. Tampi, O.S.M. and his Deputy, Wor. M.S. Chintamani then added their weight to the launching of the project by the purchase of this land and then convincing our M.W. Bro.Lord Cornwallis to lend his name to it, and so on and so forth.

We are happy to have the gracious presence of Mrs. A.P. Tampi here today who has just a few days ago returned from the U.S.A. We are also delighted to have with us Mrs. Shakuntala Devagnanam who now lives in Australia, to represent the continuity of interest that her family and her late husband Theo have exhibited in this Project and of course the President of our Board of General Purposes Bro. Theo Junior and his wife Vasanthi who have been in charge of our Chief Guests comforts during their sojourn here in India. We also have the eldest Devagnanam daughter Meera with us, who will shortly after the meeting be taking the Cornwallis away to the Nandi Hills and to her Home nearby. So the Devagnanam family is well represented in our gathering and we thank them all for their active support and particularly for being with us here today.

We, the successor administration have only completed the tasks set out for us by the earlier noble initiative of R.W. Bro. A.P. Tampi’s administration as befits an organization with our long traditions, to exhibit and support a continuity of purpose, regardless of difficulties. Therefore we must recognize our predecessor administration’s wisdom in mooting this idea, and express our gratitude for setting out such a noble task for those of us that followed, to execute.

Brethren and Friends, today you see the team efforts that have resulted from those initiatives of so long ago, and we are quite pleased to have achieved this initial result. I say initial result, as it is only the beginning of a long and arduous journey, because construction of a building for assisted living is one thing but cultivating and achieving the ‘soft skills’ required to bring care, compassion and comfort to its Residents, is quite another commitment. It has often been said that our first duty always before proceeding to solutions is to be aware of the problems and the questions posed. Let us assure all concerned that we are seized of these and the overwhelming necessity to learn those competences required to make this facility one worthy of imitation. Let me once again remind those in this gathering who are not familiar with the activities of Freemasons – that our prime purpose is Benevolence and Charity. All of us are committed to this voluntary work and many of us still lead active professional lives and spare valuable time and money to promote and sustain these charitable activities, without putting any financial burden on the Charities for their time or out-of-pocket expenses.

While on this train of thought, let me also say that we, in this Masonic District, have for some time now considered it absolutely necessary to treat our Charitable work as we would a business proposition. Which is to say that we observe all the parameters in charity work, that a business does, by considering its clientele, objectives, strategies and the application of its resources to those parameters. However, while considering charity options in a business-like way, we obviously must eschew the purely ‘commercial’ approach, for we must necessarily apply ‘heart’ to leaven the stern applications of the Mind in the planning efforts and the practical manifestations thereof.

Today we observe that such an approach is termed ‘Social Entrepreneurship’ – viz applying the principles of Business to the problems of the Community and to solutions addressed to them. This is a very necessary approach to Charity initiatives, to ensure that money is well spent, and is directed at making a discernible difference to communities and achieving a tangible social benefit. If all NGOs and social service organizations followed this approach, there would be more optimal use of our precious resources.

Therefore from the foundation of the facility laid this evening in a sense, we must not only build a superstructure but also an infrastructure which serves the causes of an ageing population. Geriatrics is still a relatively young medical speciality in our country and needs to be supported, as indeed in turn, the profession needs to support through its Specialists and Practitioners, institutions such as this one, and its inhabitants. We should also see how we can work together in the cause of the Senior Citizen.

Here we must mention that our parent organization in London The United Grand Lodge of England and Wales has endowed The Grand Charity, as it is called, which distributes large grants for various charitable purposes every year, and indeed manages through a separate administration a number of Homes of this kind, as well as offers help in assisted living in independent residences according to individual need. For example we received in South India approximately ₤500,000 or Rs.4 Crores for Tsunami Relief in 2005 alone. We have always been able to rely on our good Charity for advice and help and indeed for this Project in this case a financial grant was given and as this facility in Bangalore is the first we Masons have attempted in India, I am sure we can count on their inputs and draw on their much greater experience in negotiating our own learning curve.

We must thank our Bankers, The Oriental Bank of Commerce, and particular its Chairman, Mr. Prithviraj and its General Managers in Chennai Mr. Dinesh Vishnoi, for the commendable support they gave our application for a loan to complete the construction, their efficiency and the understanding they brought to their assessment of this Charity initiative. Without this prompt help, we would not be enjoying this, our day in the sun.

We had to obtain for our plans, the permissions of the local Panchayat and its President and the Bangalore International Airport Authority which had in the meanwhile, come into the picture, with the neighbouring Devanahalli Airport in the making. To them also we owe a debt of gratitude as our planning permissions came through with a minimum of fuss, and more, much more expeditiously than we had imagined. We cannot but recognize the part they played in getting us off the ground.

I must say we have been inordinately lucky so far with this project, and in those who have come to be associated with its planning, execution and completion. Our initial plans were drawn up by Mr. Narasimhan’s team at Venkataraman Associates the well-known Bangalore firm of Architects, which have been executed by M/s.Anand Associates, Civil Engineering Contractors, in a most competent and smooth manner, (Mr. Anand’s Brother Mr. Jagdish lived at the Site for almost a year) with Architects Bharath and Associates executing the plans with our Structural Consultant Mr. Narayana Reddy, and Mr. Guha as Advisors and our representatives keeping a watching brief over the Project – more dedicated people than these it would be hard to find. We are happy to have in our midst, a Senior Partner of the firm of Architects M/s. Bharath & Associates, Mrs. Jayshree Bharath and thank her for sparing valuable professional time to be with us. Saying thank you to all of them does not seem adequate somehow, for their scrupulous attention to specifications and budget, with the result that this project has maintained quality at all levels while finishing without any significant cost over-run. (I would now request Lord Cornwallis to hand over mementoes, tokens of our appreciation to those named).

Another pleasant surprise has been our Electrical Supply which, along with a Transformer has been installed within eight weeks of our making the required statutory applications, payments and deposits for which we have to thank the Karnataka State Electricity Board officials, and our Electrical Contractors M/s.Shiva Sakthi Electrical Enterprises. (Would Mr.H.S. Shiva Raju of Shiva Sakthi Enterprises please step forward and receive a memento).

We have so many other suppliers of services and equipment to thank and we shall be shortly making presentations to all of them to show our appreciation, in a more tangible form. Please forgive me if we have omitted any names which needed mention.

Nearer home, we had a most remarkable team effort in organizing the myriad back-room tasks to have the desired results some of which you see here. We had our former District Grand Secretary Wor. Bro. K.V. Srinivasan take up with our Bankers, the critical negotiations for the funding and his meticulous follow up got us the money and the green signal to get going on the project. Our present District Grand Secretary Wor. Bro. S. Sampath had to lay aside his business interests to do the numerous tasks assigned to him. A Task Force headed by Wor. Bro. K. Venkataramana was entrusted with all the follow up on various fronts, framing rules undertaking the publicity etc. etc. Our District Grand Treasurer Wor. Bro. D.G. Nayar was charged with the responsibility for producing the many calculations required to obtain approvals for the project finance. Our District Grand Superintendent of Works, Wor. Bro. V.J. Bharath put his architectural practice, almost on hold, to devote time to the active supervision of this project without any fee, while saving us expenditure by keeping a watchful eye on the progress of the work.

Our present DGS, Wor. Bro.S.Sampath, the Assistant Secretary, and office staff have had to cope with being a Project Office, while attending to their other duties at the District, and professional levels. To all of them we owe a debt of gratitude for their fraternal exertions which calculated in time and money terms would have easily added about a further 10% to the Project Cost. In fact my personal thanks to all our Brethren for their collective support to this Project.

Last but not least we thank all our Brethren, from Hyderabad, Chennai and Bangalore the various Task Forces with several responsibilities, my Deputy Wor. Bro. K.K. Varma, the Assistant DGM, Wor.Bro. G. Rangachari, the Presidents and Members of the Executive Council and Board of General Purposes, the District Grand Assistant Secretary, Wor.Bro. J.M.I. Sait and staff for all the energy put into organizing this tour of the Cornwallisses culminating in this Inauguration ceremony.

A word about our recently appointed Administrator, Col. Divakar Ahobalappa who joined us barely eight weeks ago, and immediately set about his tasks with such gusto that one now knows what is meant by tackling issues on a war footing. Along with a separate Governing Council for this Home, he will be the Resident Executive to oversee the proper management of the facility. The Council will have a representative of the Residents to voice their concerns. Thank you Col. Divakar for your enthusiastic exertions and through them, achieving the desired results.

I thank all those who have travelled long distances to be with us today and particularly Lord and Lady Cornwallis, the DGMs from Bombay, Calcutta, our own Brethren and their Ladies and so many other of our friends and connections who are here to share this precious moment with us.

You will, perhaps, have noticed that as the Principal Functionary of our local Masonic dispensation, I am proposing what is virtually a Vote of Thanks – a departure from normal practice. By this action, I wish to emphasise how much I appreciate the Teamwork that has produced the results you see before you, a duty which I could not entrust to anyone else – that is the duty of personally thanking all my Brethren for their cooperation and commitment to their Masonic obligations.

Thank You one and all!