Human Interaction Services by Vishvet Foundation

‘Ahmedabad Darshan’ with Hon. Ambassador of Netherlands – Experience of a volunteer guide of Vishvet Foundation (www.vishvetfoundation.org)

“Netherlands और भारत की दोस्ती बनी रहे - Alponsus Stoelinga”

I met him a day before at King’s Day celebration by Netherlands Business Support Office (NBSO), Ahmedabad

From Left Mr. Dhimant Upadhyay (Chairperson of Vishvet Foundation), Mr. Stoelinga (Ambassador of Netherlands), Mr. Job Glas (Chief Representative of NBSO,Ahmedabad) and I)

Mr. Job Glas and Mr. Stoelinga at ATMA house

where audience became fan of his special lines in Hindi “Netherlands Aur Bharat ki Dosti Bani Rahe” (Netherlands and India will remain friends). 

We liked his dedication towards strengthening the relationship between India & Netherlands especially in the field of engineering, education, food & processing, dairy products and water management.

During the discussion with him he expressed his interest to visit places in Ahmedabad and I offered him to become his guide. And here I got an opportunity to accompany him for the places like ATMA House (Ahmedabad Textile Mill Owners' Association House') and Gandhi Ashram.

As a volunteer associated with Vishvet Foundation, I got this opportunity to become volunteer guide to Mr. Ambassador which couldn’t happen otherwise.

Very next day I reached by 8.30 am at his hotel where Mr. Job Glas (Chief Representative at NBSO also from Netherlands) was waiting in reception corridor. After few minutes Mr. Stoelinga arrived there which gave me another lesson of value of time.

We have visited first place ATMA house which is one of the oldest building in the world designed by famous French architect Le Corbusier. It was also good to know that Mr. Ambassador himself was an Architect in his earlier profession. He was impressed by the architectural design of the building.

After that we went to Gandhi Ashram (Sabarmati Ashram) This was one of the residences of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, also known as Mahatma Gandhi, who lived there for about twelve years along with his wife, Kasturba Gandhi.  Here we received a warm welcome by a female volunteer of Ashram who was waiting for us.  She showed a live demo to Mr. Ambassador on how to use Charkha for making thread out of raw cotton. He enjoyed that practical exposure of becoming self dependent on personal needs which was a great lesson taught by Mahatma Gandhi to the world.

During the discussion with Mr. Ambassador we shared thoughts on Indian economy, education system, family planning and especially on current political scenario and of course on Mr. Narendra Modi as well. He admired personally Mr. Modi’s personality and the support, Government is giving to develop businesses. There was no protocol and I was not a media person which I think was reason for us to share frankly.

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Mr. Job Glas was a silent observer during the visit but he gave some valuable inputs which was new information to me as well.

I hope he had  a nice impression about places that we visited, about Gujarat and topics on India. I tried to do good homework before the visit, which helped me a lot.

He liked the work of Vishvet Foundation where people are getting opportunity to have an education and cultural exchange with world’s universities, schools and other professional institutions. He motivated us to work more with Netherlands.

It was a meeting with two humble people who are here with a mission of developing relations with India. I didn’t tell him we’ll meet again but surprisingly those words came from Mr. Ambassador himself- “Fir Milenge”.

I am thankful to high commission of Netherlands, NBSO officials and Vishvet Foundation for giving me this opportunity.

Thank you

Nishant Dubey

shantnishant@yahoo.co.in