Street Smart Supremo, Neelu Khanna arranged the visit. She has been associated with DLS for the past 42 years and the previous President of the Society, Swami Chidanandaji Maharaj was also her Guru. Neelu Khanna’s father has been a Trustee of the Ashram for many years & Chidanandaji was very fond of him & treated him as his confidant.

It was Swami Padmanabhan who earlier donated Rs,20,000/- to Street Smart and ever since then, our “Neelu ma’am” (in her own words) has been ‘hounding’ him  to visit our little world. During his visit to Street Smart, Swamiji was informed in detail about how the project functions, the routine, the problems, the parents, the facilities provided, the monthly expenses, the paucity of funds, et all!

They walked into Rein Basera at 1pm and saw the kids working in groups, quite busy. All the children came & touched Swamiji’s feet and he interacted with a couple of them. Swamiji seemed very happy to see the older lot busy with handicrafts and block printing and saw the various things that the group had made. Then our little kids assembled and treated him to ‘He Sharde Ma’; after which Swamiji sang ‘Hare Ram, Ram Ram Hare Hare”. All the kids happily sang with him.

Swamiji has invited our children to go to the ashram at Rishikesh and of course they promptly wanted to know if they could go tomorrow!! Here are a few pictures from the day: