Lakshmi Challa
honored for pro
bono work
A CORRESPONDENT
The Richmond Bar Associationin Virginia has honored Lakshmi Challa, managing partner and
owner of the Challa Law Offices, with
the John C Kenny Pro Bono Award.
The award is presented annually to
an individual or law firm that demonstrates a dedication to furthering the
delivery of pro bono legal services to
the poor and underserved in the
Richmond Metro area. The award was
presented at the RBA’s monthly luncheon meeting in Richmond.
In 2009, working with the Virginia
Poverty Law Center, Challa established the immigrant Victims of
Domestic Violence Project, which provides pro bono legal assistance to
undocumented immigrants who are
victims of domestic or sexual violence
in obtaining legal status in the US
without reliance on their abusers. Challa
recruited the University of Richmond
School of Law as a partner in this project, using law students to assist pro bono.
The project has helped over 50 women
remain in the United States, work legally, and provide for their families and
their children.
Challa has helped the Commonwealth
Catholic Charities, an organization offering support services to individuals and
families throughout Virginia. A member
of the board of directors for the Virginia
Poverty Law Center, she has done pro
bono work for the Red Cross too.
Her law firm has been appointed three
times by the office of the Virginia attorney general as special counsel on immigration matters. She was selected as one
Lakshmi Challa
of Inside Business journal’s ‘Top 40
Under 40’ business professionals in the
Richmond area.
She has helped many Hindu temples in
North America by helping them get
priests over.
She was also part of the trade delegations Governor Mark Warner and
Governor Tim Kaine led to India.
Challa was an adjunct professor at the
University of Richmond, where she
taught immigration compliance to
human resources personnel. Governor
Bob MacDonald had appointed her to
the Virginia Commonwealth University’s
Health Systems Board. She is an alumna
of Andhra University and the University
of Richmond’s T C Williams School of
Law.
25 years of teaching Hinduism
in a Christian college
;Page A32
Advaita Worldview: God, World and
Humanity, and The Hindu Vision and
Gitamrtam: The Essential Teachings of the
Bhagavad Gita. His writings include a
series of commentaries on the Ramayan. He
also spent three years studying Hinduism at
Mumbai seminary.
“As a Hindu, I must readily admit my difficulty to be enthusiastic about the college
motto with its mythical or historical images
of battle,” he said.
In an essay, he wrote: ‘It is a continuing
source of delight to me that my students are
willing to grapple with the meaning of faith
for people of other traditions and, increas-
ingly, with the implications of such faith for
their own beliefs.’
He said he came to St Olaf with a deep
interest in interreligious dialogue and, in
particular, in the dialogue between
Hinduism and Christianity.
“Dialogue is difficult, risky and challeng-
ing, but it is a necessity of our times,” he
continued. “I have sustained this interest
outside of the college in many ways. But a
college of the church affords me a unique
daily opportunity, both in and out of the
classroom, to engage in and to draw my stu-
dents into the creativity of dialogue, discov-
ering what religions share with each other
and learning to respect differences.”
He is active in the dialogue programs of
the World Council of Churches, and was a
Hindu guest and participant in the last four
General Assemblies of the World Council of
Churches in Vancouver, Canada, Canberra,
Australia, Harare, Zimbabwe and Puerto
Alegre, Brazil. He is a regular participant in
the consultations of the Pontifical Council
for Interreligious Dialogue at the Vatican
and an educator on interfaith issues in
Minnesota.
Rambachan, whose wife is a doctor from
Trinidad and whose three children include
the Rhodes Scholar Ishana, is an adviser to
Harvard University’s Pluralism Project, a
member of the International Advisory
Council for the Tony Blair Faith Foundation,
and a member of the Theological Education
Committee of the American Academy of
Religion. In April 2008, at the invitation of
the archbishop of Canterbury, Rambachan
delivered the distinguished Lambeth
Lecture at Lambeth Palace, London. He
also delivered the invocation address at the
historic White House Celebration of the
Hindu festival of Diwali in 2003 and 2004.
No one cannot ignore the fact that the
United States is now the world’s most religiously diverse nation, he asserted.
“A college of the church seems to me to be
a particularly appropriate place to identify
and explore the many new questions that
continue to be generated by our experience
of religious diversity,” he added. “I welcome
the opportunity to explore such issues with
my students.”
He has critics within the Hindu communi-
ty in America, he admitted.
“It is not unusual for religious nationalists
who differ with my understanding of
Hinduism to preclude discussion by brand-
ing and then denouncing my viewpoint as a
Christianized Hinduism,” he said. “My work
at a Christian college is represented as con-
straining me, and I quote, ‘to toe the
Christian line,’ in order to maintain my
tenure.”
On the other extreme, a St Olaf graduate
felt Rambachan’s work at the college would
become meaningful only if he became a
Christian.
“I am comfortable in the space between
these extremes,” the professor said. “And it
will not surprise you to hear that I reject
both.”
;Page A36
used to visit us in summer from India. Our
parents were too busy running their fledg-
ling businesses and had little time to teach
us about religion or culure. Once I got to
know these things from her, I never wor-
ried about wanting to shave my beard or
getting rid of the patka.”
From its early years, the entertainment
show ran for half an hour every Saturday
and in summer had another 30 minutes
added. Sethi, who was 5 when his family
migrated from India, was so involved in it
from his high school years that he did not
go to college. He admits it was unusual in
America for a child of educated immigrant
parents not to go to college.
“I began watching a lot of American television shows and learned many things
about making a slick Indian TV show,” he
says. Twenty five years ago, most desi shows
A 25-year love for Indian films
lacked sophistication and variety. Even his
America-raised Indian friends would
make fun of desi shows, complaining how
clueless and awkward the hosts were, he
recalls.
“One of the first things I did was — when
I thought we should expand our show and
do live interviews with visiting Indian
movie artists, singers, composers and film-
makers —create a lively logo,” he continues.
“I asked my father (for) $1,000 to do this
and he just could not understand why I
wanted to do it. It was like he could not
understand why I was spending hours and
hours running after actors and filmmakers.
He used to say, ‘Just play a few hit songs,’
wondering loud who would want to listen
to stars and directors. Though my father
wondered if it was worth spending that
much money on a logo, he was always sup-
portive of my efforts. $1,000 was quite a
fortune more than two decades ago, And
when he gave me the money, he said some-
thing like, ‘This is your Christmas, New
Year and birthday gift for this year and
many more years’.”
The show was called Asian Variety
Program for years. One week, TV Guide
listed it as Asian Variety Show. “We decid-
ed to go with the typo,” he says.
