Dear Friends,
It is our privilege and honour to welcome you all to Berwick Ayalkoottam’s 2016/17 activities. We take this opportunity to thank all the members who elected this new committee in a new format to pursue restructuring and incorporating our community group. We assure all of you that our objectives of this year for the welfare of this rapidly growing community will be met with all your support and cooperation.
The demands of the world today force our children to live out the highest values of both India and Australia. Living up to the principles and ideals of both these great nations is a huge task. However, those who attempt this have tremendous advantages over other children globally. As parents, it is our responsibility to support them to be equipped for these and encourage facing similar challenges.
We also have challenges of involving more people to actively put forward suggestions and participate in the growth of our community. It is also important that we can hold events in a very safe manner that is expected by the relevant authorities and the community. Realising these needs, this committee has come up with number of plans which will help our community grow as well as preserve and promote the social, cultural, moral, literary and artistic heritage of Gods own country.
Our community togetherness helps learning about ourselves through the give and take of relationship with others. This kind of learning does not happen by writing or thinking about community, it happens only as we are willing to plunge into it, in all its messiness. This is a wonderful community and keep up the good work we have been doing past 7 years.
Important actions undertaken by the committee
We are so happy to announce that incorporating of our Ayalkoottam has been done. We are officially incorporated under the Associations Incorporation Reform Regulations of Victoria. This has enabled us to actively communicate with government agencies and facility providers to seek help in holding community events in a safe and established manner. We are incorporated under the name “BAI (Berwick Ayalkoottam Incorporated”)
We also have secured an annual public liability insurance up to 10 Million dollars, which covers all the events being held during next one year and we now hold an ABN as well.
We have been in touch with Council and State authorities and applied for two community grants, one from Casey Council and the other from Victorian government. The decisions on these grants will only happen during June this year. We have also been told that there would be more grants we may be eligible to apply in the future too. The fact is that there are hundreds of community groups who have been receiving these grants, which is budgeted by the council from the council rates we pay.
Committee has developed a logo for the Association and can be seen in the
newsletter.
Various other actions planned for the year
Digital newsletter to members
Other than sending emails for each activity or actions, it has been decided to send official newsletters with various event details periodically.
Website for Ayalkoottam
It has been decided to create a stable website for Ayalkoottam and release officially during Onam event. Proposed domain name is-
Registration form and annual registration fees
It is mandatory that members must formally register to be a member of an incorporated community group. Therefore, we will send out a single page membership form with very basic details. There had been also discussions in the past AGMs to have a small annual membership fee to registered members. The committee is now proposing to collect $10 annually for a family to cover the cost of Public liability insurance. We hope $10/family for one year is not a big amount and will cover the safety of the members during the events throughout the year. Anyone who has objections to this, please reply by email.
Involving more people
Although Ayalkoottam has around 110 families and still growing, some members are not seemed very active. Committee discussed various activities to create more interaction between people and draw more members to the Ayalkootam events.
Events for the year
Committee discussed various events possible for the year.
Onam 2016
Major event Onam 2016 has been tentatively planned for the date 24th September. We will form various sub committees for the events, which will help to organise the whole event well. There will be invitations to sponsor the Onam event. A formal tariff has been prepared to enable this process. Venue and other details will be announced soon.
Sports/games competitions
We plan to organise some Games / Sports competitions before Onam, such as caroms, chess, cards, Badminton etc. Will hire a hall and do the preliminary rounds before Onam.
Onam souvenir
Committee has proposed to release an Onam souvenir with sponsor’s details and members articles. Committee is welcoming articles, short stories, poems and paintings from members. Selected items will be featured in the souvenier.
Children’s contribution for children charity in India
Since all kids put lots of effort for Onam event, some part of their effort needs to go for kids charity. Some of the ideas are-
- Give some part of the profit of Onam event to children charity in India
- A moneybox kept at the Onam event in which everyone can contribute some amount especially kids if they want to contribute their pocket money. This will be handed to children charity in India.
- As usual, carol collections also will also be used for charity.
Periodical swap meet and musical nights
Committee is looking at possibility of getting a council facility periodically where small events of music, swapping of Malayalm books and other activities can be done. The major activities will include book sharing, practices, games and theme based musical meets (Eg ONV smarana, 80s day, Raveendran night etc). We will also incorporate ‘Ramadan’ celebration with one of these meets.
Family picnic
Committee proposed for a family picnic with below options
- One day picnic
- Overnight stay family picnic
- Mount buller or any other snow places in June end or July
- Any other camping places during AFL final day.
Blood donation camp
Committee proposed to hold a blood donation camp with the help of Red Cross. More details will be announced later.
Walking / Laughing club
Since many people are walking in different places, we can incorporate a walking and laughing session once in a week at two or more different locations in and around Berwick.
Christmas/New year celebration
Since the carols will be held for a few weeks, it could be ideal that a Christmas / New year event is scheduled in a hall on the last day of carol and celebrate with the carol team in their costumes.
Vishu / Easter Celebration
As usual the Vishu / Easter celebrations will be the last event organised by the working committee and will have AGM on the same day.
The committee is very keen to hear from you all, about suggestions and inputs which can help us all grow as a vibrant community.
Thanks and Best regards
Berwick Ayalkoottam committee 2016/17
Email: ayalkoottam2016@gmail.com
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