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Friday, March 29 2024
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Mysuru

Celebrating festival with have nots

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Mysuru: For Dr Anil Thomas who is a dentist and politician since over two decades, any festival including Christmas is meaningful only if it is celebrated with those people who are unable to celebrate festivals due to various reasons including financial instability.

Anil Thomas, who is into dentist profession for the past 22 years and equally active in politics as president of City BJP Minority wing said, “Earlier Christmas eve usually started a day prior to the festival but now it starts a week earlier. Basically it is done to remember Jesus who was our savior. During the night mass, especially at St Philomena’s church, people from not only Christian community but also various other communities irrespective  of caste and creed come together and celebrate Christmas”.

After night mass, for Anil Thomas the Christmas day starts at 4 am itself. This year, after attending mass again in the morning and having breakfast with the community people and family members at St Gregarious Orthodox Syrian Church, near Garden Tennis Club, Anil Thomas went to Bishop’s House to wish and seek the blessing of Bishop Thomas Vazhapilly. After spending nearly 30 minutes with Bishop along with Mayor Ravi Kumar and other politicians and discussing various issues including properties of Christian community, Anil Thomas went home to celebrate the festival with family, relative and friends.

As soon as the friends and relatives gathered, Anil Thomas and his wife Bindu A Thomas who is working as Associate Professor at Vidya Vikas Engineering College and son Adam A Thomas greeted them with the Christmas special “Rich Plum cake”. Later, the couple had lunch with the guests with Christmas special dishes including chicken biryani, mutton fry, Paal Appam, Mutton Stew, Vattayappam, Aval Vilayichathu, wine, rose cookies, Chakkuli, cutlets, vegetable salad and fruit salad. “The preparation of some of these items starts few days prior to the fest,” added Bindu Thomas.  Especially cake and wine preparation is started a few weeks before the fest.

After having lunch with friends and relatives, Anil Thomas who believes the festival is incomplete without spending time with the needy and orphans went to the Mother Teresa Home for the Disabled, Aged and Orphans to celebrate the festival with them. He arranged for different varieties of food for more than 60 people. Accompanied by his party members, he mingled with the orphans, disabled and the aged for more than an hour. Later in the evening, as part of the festival he went to few churches and distributed few materials including sewing machines to the needy people. “The festival should be different. Celebrating festival ourselves doesn’t have any meaning. There are people who are deprived of the celebrations due to various reasons including financial constraints. If we celebrate with such people it will be really meaningful,” added a philanthropic Anil Thomas. Since the time he started earning, he is into this practice of helping the needy people.

“During this time most of us take off from our regular routine and try to call our friends, relatives whom we might not have interacted with for many months. Earlier, we used to get more than 100 greeting cards but now due to e-system we hardly get few cards,” added Anil Thomas.

Celebrating festival with have nots

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