LEXINGTON, MA–Getting Involved Group, a Lexington, MA-based organization whose objective has been to provide a platform and support system for Indian Americans to help increase their participation in town government and committees, has formalized its structure and has changed its name to Indian American Getting Involved Group, which will be known by its acronym as iGiG.
iGiG also adopted new bylaws and elected Sanjay Padaki as its first president.
Mr. Padaki is Lexington’s Town Meeting Member and has lived in Lexington with his wife and two children since 2005. He actively volunteers in many town activities and serves on the town’s Appropriation Committee, a nine-member panel that oversees Lexington’s finances. He also volunteers at many Indian American related events and has been a key member of the Getting Involved Group (GIG), now iGiG. Mr. Padaki has a doctoral degree in Chemical Engineering and works in the biopharmaceutical industry.
iGiG also elected other officers: Ist Vice President: Ravish Kumar; 2nd Vice President: Jyotsna Kakullavarapu; Secretary: Sudhir Ranjan; and Assistant Secretary: Sunny Chandra.
“All great movements eventually get organized,” said Narain Bhatia, one of the key founders of iGiG who has lived in Lexington for more than four decades. “As we have grown in numbers it has become important to put some structure to our informal organization so we can sustain it and move it.”
iGiG bylaws says that membership in the group is limited to Indian Americans living in Lexington who are interested in the mission and activities of iGiG. The mission of the organize is to “actively reach, educate and encourage Lexington Indian Americans to participate in the governance of the Town of Lexington and its committees.”
One of the goals of iGiG is to help Indian Americans living in Lexington get elected to Town government and to get appointed to the boards, committees and commissions of the Town.
iGiG bylaws defines an Indian American as “a person living in the USA whose ancestry belongs to the Republic of India. For the purposes of the iGiG organization, if one member of the family is Indian American the rest of the family members also qualify as Indian Americans.”
Mr. Bhatia said that in his experience bylaws of a typical Indian American organization are often slightly modified boilerplate from a similar organization which at some point don’t match its needs, creates bureaucratic fights and are difficult to amend.
“In contrast bylaws of a great organization allow its leaders to create a balance between making things happen,” said Mr. Bhatia. “Let me repeat: create a balance between Making things happen and letting things happen.”
iGiG, previously known as GIG, was launched in 2014 with the intent of encouraging and supporting civic participation by Indian Americans in Lexington.
Current iGiG members are Amit Srivastava, Aneesha Karody, Anil Ahuja, Deepika Sawhney, Dinesh Patel, Hema Bhatt, Narain Bhatia, Dinesh Patel, Pam Joshi, Ravish Kumar, Rita Pandey, Sandhya Beebee, Sanjay Padaki, Sudhir Ranjan, Sunny Chandra, Syed Ali Rizvi, Vikas Kinger and Vineeta Kumar.
