Speech that I never gave :-|

Thank you Bob and thank you Raj. I would also like to thank the jury for selecting me as one of the recipient of the first ever Community Impact Awards 2008. As I understand that Deloitte is a truly meritocratic environment where to excel one has to continuously raise the bar, this would have not been possible without the constant support from the year round Reach Out team, whose persistent enthusiasm kept the fire burning through out the year. The dedication that the team has shown is commendable. I would like to express my special thanks to Pankaj Jalan who believed in my capabilities and handed over the charge of coordinating the thread activities when he had to go for a project onsite. Thanks again to Raj for connecting me to Pankaj who will soon be starting a new journey of life with a mate this time as he got engaged just a week back. Congratulation Pankaj! I am glad for you!

I find myself fortunate that I am associated with Deloitte which offers a strong platform and encourages employees for community service initiatives. For someone like me who is straight out of the college, Deloitte not only provided an excellent environment for professional growth but also for personal growth and building relations as well.

I enjoyed every moment of my community service. The satisfaction I could draw was tremendous. Tomorrow it is Rakhi which reminds me that last year when I was looking for someone to tie me a knot I was blessed with two sisters from 7th grad I was teaching. Not only that, at times, when I was low in life the activity gave me a purpose to extend.

Just a quick description of the activity would include: we visited an orphanage and aged elders home "Sathya Sai Vidya Mandir", an institution near BharatNagar MMTS railway station. They also run a school till 10th standard and have a few resident undergraduate students as well. Our activity involved teaching maths to class 1, 2, 3 and 7, help college students with their end semester exams, help the institution create and manage records for all the members and spend time with orphans and aged elders.

Before I am asked to loose the control over the mike, please allow me to quote Late Dr. Randy Pausch from his 2008 commencement speech at Carnegie Mellon, "Find your passion and in my experience no matter what you do at work, or what you do in official settings, that passion will be grounded in people. It will be grounded in the relationships you have with people and what they think of you when your time comes."

Thank you.