text: Going beyond worship - International News - Issue Date: May 15, 1995
  Temples emerge as new social and cultural meeting place in US
  UPDATED: June 21, 2013 16:10 IST
  A procession; and (inset) a birthday party at a temple: recreating India
  Chiming bells and pale orange flames from diyas and bhajans are the images temples generally conjure up. But not in the US it seems. Here they have become more than just places of worship - they are the new social and cultural meeting places. Venues where Indians catch up with the grapevine; attend language, dance and music classes, concerts, plays and discourses; and hold birthday parties and, of course, weddings.
  Ask 29-year-old mechanical engineer Subhashini Reddy She met Alok Sharma ,30, while organising a cultural event at the newly built Hindu temple in Raleigh, North Carolina. "We kept running into each other at several temple functions. It was a nice place to meet," says Subhashini. After dating during temple activities, she married Alok at the temple where they had first met.
  Most temples organise cultural evenings at least twice a month. And music, dance and language classes are held weekly. The infrastructure is all there: almost all of them have large halls that can accommodate over 600 people, a stage equipped with proper lighting, a public-address system and a modern kitchen with a large-scale catering facility.
  The Hindu Temple Society of North America in New York, which is already spread over 55,500 sq ft, recently acquired a 16,000 sq ft plot to build an ambitious $5 million community centre. The Hindu Society of North Carolina and the Hindu Temple of Greater Chicago are building community halls to accommodate roughly 1,200 people.
  As much as temples cater to the needs of the Indian community, they encourage cultural activities because it makes good business sense. A classical evening featuring Pandit Ravi Shankar at North Carolina's temple, for example, made a profit of $2,000 even after paying the sitar maestro $13,000. On an average, around 1,000 people visit a temple every week. And the turnout goes up to 5 0,000 for a cultural evening or on major festivals like Diwali.
  Almost all temples have formed youth wings where students organise their own socio-cultural programmes.
  Both young and old are thronging temples. The first generation sees them as a place to introduce their children to Indian values and culture. "To me and my family, the temple is an emotional anchor. The only way to maintain Indianness in an all-American world," says Nirupma Rao Sista of New York. News of prospective brides and grooms is spread by word of mouth, and there is no better place to catch up with it than at the temple. In fact, the New York temple maintains a marriage register to help parents matchmake.
  And for the youngsters, the temple has become a place to meet friends and talk about everything on earth - and India in particular. A place to turn out in one's ethnic best. In recent years, almost all temples have formed youth wings where school and college students organise their own socio-cultural programmes.
  Organising cultural events and parties in a temple is both convenient and cheap. Whereas hiring a commercial party hall for four hours costs anywhere between $100 and $200, at a temple it would be as little as $15-$50.
  The weekly Indian-language dance and music classes are extremely popular. At the Raleigh temple, as many as 500 young people between the age of 10 and 20 attend them. "They develop a well rounded character just being around other Indian children," says Rafiq Bandook wala, an Indian Muslim associated with the Raleigh temple. Obviously, culture knows no religious barriers as Bandookwala is not the only non-Hindu involved in these cultural activities.
  Temples encourage cultural activities to attract patrons. "People celebrate different milestones of their lives at temples and get emotionally attached," says Sista. Cultural and social activities contribute up to 20 per cent of temple kitties, which often run into a million dollars.
  As temples grow richer and invest in better facilities to accommodate large social events, they become cultural workshops for many second-generation Indians, even as their parents relax and pray, secure in the knowledge that their offspring are learning the Indian way of life.