About Us

Sometimes the wrong choices we make bring us to the right places. Like many, Belur  Bhagavan, the founding trustee grew up and thrived on an empty and vain thought - “I am a self made man”.  Because of the realization of the many kindnesses and gifts that he had received from innumerable sources this ‘self made’ idea gradually dissolved.  His grandfather, Mr. Kadur Seetharamaiah  had lovingly spared Rs. 40 out of his Rs. 50 rupee pension,  everymonth,  for educating poor students giving only Rs. 10 to Mrs. Parvatamma for house hold expenses. 

Knowing Bhagavan’s struggles, many of his friends often sent him funds to support his education in Calcutta. Unbeknown of Bhagavan or Bhagavan’s struggles,  themselves refugees from “East Pakistan” struggling  to setlle down in their new environment, the Roy family from East Pakistan  provided free roof,  room,  and seperately cooked vegetarian food for the entire period of his medical education in Calcutta.  During this period, Sahu Jain Charity of Calcutta  granted loan scholarship  to fully  pay for the college fees. 

As Pablo Picasso has rightly said, “ the meaning of life is to find your gift; the purpose of life is to give it away”.  A slow but haunting  sense of gratitude developed and eventuated in the realization that there was  an accrued debt of gratitude that he owed not only to the specific people who aided him but also to the society at large for the opportunities provided to become a doctor and a productive member of the society. 

Having settled in America and having received similar opportunites from different people  from across the globe and whose only reason to help him was that he was in “need”,  Belur Bhagavan decided to Pay-It-Forward to those  in need without regard to caste, creed, color, gender and regional or national origin. A sense of gratitude,  a sense of accrued debt owed to society that needed to be absolved  and a need to honor   his grandfather for help early on,  were the sources of inspiration for Leela and Belur Bhagavan to start the trust in 1994.

The answer is a resounding “No”. Education as a means of obtaining a degree or diploma and gainful employment is not an end unto itself. Yes, the trust is an enabler for realizing the educational goal. 

Ultimately, the educated individual should stand up tall as a well rounded, civic minded, socially responsible, compassionate and tolerant beacon in his / her society helping to uplift the less fortunate and downtrodden members so that everyone will have an equal opportunity to be respected and a useful contributor to the society.

Mr. Kadur Seetharamaiah was a secular scholar, a person of profound equanimity, composure and charity at heart.  He was an accountant in the British Colonial India who retired and drew a pension of 50 rupees per month for about 50 years till he passed away in  1966 at the age of 96.  His liberalism, equanimity, scholarship and charity not only made him an extraordinary person but also one who was a role model to be emulated by others.  As an example of his charity, he kept only 10 rupees for himself from out of his pension and spent 40 rupees for education of the needy in the last few decades of his life.  Mrs. Parvathamma was married to him and was his supporting partner in his pursuits.  As a tribute to the outstanding qualities of this couple, the  Kadur Seetharamaiah & Parvathamma Trust was started and is named after the them.

The trust does not subscribe only to the propinquity of our act of charity or compassion just to make these youngsters economically free and self supporting.

The immediacy of this benefit is obvious and plain. In the long run what the trust hopes for is an enduring, albeit, a slow transformation of the society populated with altruistic people sustained by the strength of their personal, ethical and moral characters. This change comes with transformation of individuals, one person at a time. 

The ulterior aim of KSPC Trust is to stimulate beneficiaries of the trust to become the seedlings for such a society.

At the outset, we are not educators. We are only enablers of education. Second, we do not discriminate on the basis of caste, creed, color, gender or, regional or national origin. Third, while we admire and encourage merit and high scholastic achievement, even this is not the basis for discrimination. Fourth, the Trust does not believe in an expedient hand out. Rather, it creates a sense of debt and thus a sense of gratitude. 

We feel, education combined with compassion and gratitude encourages an awareness of continuation of social responsibility and the need to pay-it-forward.

The monies earned from the total corpus funds are calculated each year. About 15 percent of this ploughed back into the corpus itself. Deductions are made for expenses which amount to approximately 5 to 7 percent. The residual monies are spent to give our financial aid to students. 

All the trustees including the honorary secretary are volunteers and freely give their time and resources. They are not paid either in the form of salary or honorarium. They are not even reimbursed for expenses. Every penny saved is penny earned for charity. And, charity is at the center of the heart of the trust.

The hope is that education begets humility and in turn an ability to participate in collaborative interactive human transactions. The participation facilitates rightful wealth acquisition. Personal wealth evokes realization and performance of social and civic duties and in turn arouses generosity of heart and an enduring happiness. True charity involves fellow feeling and selfless sharing of whatever gift is affordable. 

This is the value system that we subscribe to now and hope to inculcate in the future generation. Education underscores this value system. 

"As our forebears have done, so have we given the gift of education and health to our children. They shall pass it on"
 

The Trust does not believe in an expedient “hand out” for charity. Rather, it has the loftier principle of achieving social transformation by helping those to help themselves as well as who recognize the importance of helping others and contributing to the evolution of a tolerant, humanistic, secular and multicultural society. This principle is known as “pay it forward”. “Pay it forward” is an expression for describing the beneficiary of a good deed repaying it to others instead of to the original benefactor. 

The concept is old, but the phrase may have been coined 100 years ago. This is our guiding philosophy and is promoted by encouraging the beneficiaries to pay back the loan so that others in need may benefit. The beneficiaries of the Trust are expected to share similar objectives. They are the Trust’s ambassadors-at- large who help in identifying and recommending future worthy candidates in need. 

The beneficiaries’ recommendation letter for a candidate, their support as guarantors will carry a lot of weight and receive careful consideration from the Trust. Thus the beneficiary has a continuing role in the Trust.