?There has to be darkness before the dawn; the more prolonged the darkness, more brilliant will be the dawn,? said Shri P. Parameswaran, national president of Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari, on March 20. He was addressing an assembly of eminent intellectuals at the grihapravesham ceremony of Vivekananda Kendra International at Chanakyapuri in New Delhi. The atmosphere was such that some of the participants expressed that they felt as if Swami Vivekananda has returned from the Chicago World Parliament of Religions. Some of the distinguished persons who attended the event were former Lt. Governor of Delhi Shri Vijai Kapur; former Lt. Governor of Andamans and Nicobar; Shri Ishwari Prasad Gupta and former director of IB Shri Ajit Doval. Housed in a 32,000 square feet area in the prestigious diplomatic enclave of Chanakyapuri, the Vivekananda Kendra International will continue the work that Swami Vivekananda carried out in the World Parliament of Religions in 1893 at Chicago in the genre of Inter-Civilisational Dialogue. Earlier, in the day, elaborate house warming poojas were conducted in the premises led by Shri Khandeshwar of Saraswat tradition.
(FOC)
