THE ‘ROUND TABLERS’ FROM THE NETHERLANDS…
RAISING FUNDS FOR AN EDUCATIONAL CAUSE

By Tara Narayan

TALK OF school children having a social conscien-ce…the school children of the Netherlands (or Holland) surely have it. Last week some interesting visitors rolled into Goa in their convoy of Landrovers, dusty, plastered over with all kinds of stickers and organizational labels, testifying to the fact that they’ve come all the way from the Netherlands, via China. They called themselves members of the Round Table Organisation, an organization tracing its foundation way back in 1927 in the U.K. by a Rotarian, who thought they had already enlightened adults but there was a supplementary need to enlighten the children of the world! Or so one gathered from Roger A.B.C. Rammers who’s the chairman of the group in the Netherlands.

The 47-strong group comprising of six women and 14 children (in the age group of five to 19 years) had booked in at Ronil’s Beach Resort in Baga on August 4 for some rest and recreation after a marathon drive from China (at least the men came over land, the women and children flew in).They’d left the Netherlands four weeks ago, flying out to Beijing and commencing their overland route on May 6, traversing through China and then catching the high altitude “friendship road” from Tibet to Nepal, India…the entire itinerary covered United Arab Emirates, Oman, Yeman, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Turkey, Europe and finally back home to the Netherlands by the first week of November later this year.

Contributing and raising funds for education. . . Round Tablers from the Netherlands roll into Goa. (Inset) Chair-man Roger Rammers.

It was not just an exciting travel adventure for them, said Mr. Rammers and other spokespersons for the group, namely Paul and Esther Brussard and Jeroen Gietema. They were also on a “Freedom through education” mission for which Round Tablers including children had raised funds in the Netherlands doing odd jobs like selling cookies and renting themselves out as Santa Claus during Christmas. All for the cause! According to Mr. Rammers they had raised 400,000 euros (Rs 2 crores?) for school projects in countries like China (where they haven’t yet invested anything because no Round Table groups have come up there yet), Nepal (where they have already funded two schools) and India where they have several projects under way, including two projects in Goa. There are three Round Table groups in Goa with about 128 members represented by Gaurish Dhond, who is the honorary area-in-charge. Other members present at the press conference held last week included Vinod Kumar (chairman of the Panjim City Round Table), T. Raman, Oslinda Vaz, Dushyant P. Kamath and others.

According to Mr. Rammers of the Netherlands Round Table, they worked on a guiding principle of matching fifty percent of whatever funds raised by local Round Table groups for “providing primary education infrastructure to help one million children by 2008”. Underprivileged children of course. In this respect they had already contributed Rs.Two lakhs towards funding two projects i.e. the Ideal High School in Chimbel and the Santa Barbars High School in Taleigao in Goa. From the sound of it India seems to be the largest beneficiary with about 30 projects already under way in Delhi, Nagpur (two schools), Hyderabad (four schools), Hubli and Dharwad (17 schools), Pune (2 schools) and Mumbai (2 schools), also up north in Dehradun. This is the first time the Netherlands groups have traveled so extensively in India to take stock of how projects funded by them are doing and Mr.Rammers speak very highly of some of the Round Tablers in India who’ve raised funds for the cause of educational infrastructure in the country.

The Round Tablers from the Netherlands were on their way to Pune after a break in Goa. Speaking informally later, the bluff and genial Dr. Rammers said that Round Tables exist in 42 countries now and membership is open only to those below 40 years, “I had to resign when I crossed 40!” But he continues to be the chairman because of his long association with the Netherlands Round Tablers. From Lhasa in Tibet it had been a grueling but exhilarating overland trip fraught with many hardships vis-à-vis food and water, with drivers and even the doctor in the group falling prey to the high altitude and there were foodie problems, “One day 14 of us were sick!”

Their tough Landrovers had something like 3,000 kgs by way of baggage and sometimes they were driving 14 hours a day, fording rivers in the mountain terrain, dealing with mud, water and landslides, but on the whole, “We were very fortunate.” Most of the women and children had of course skipped the overland mountain trip and just flown into Kathmandu in Nepal where they met up with the hardcore travelers…but their two-month traveling in China across 10,000 kms had been very educative. And now they were in India, another fascinating country. For Mr. Roger Rammers it was a fourth trip and he said he’d become familiar with some of the problems faced by Indians. The former government of India had actually turned down funds from the Netherlands for educational purposes under the proud excuse that “We are a developed country!” The Netherlands, he said, had very high standards of education in Europe and with a population of about 16 million it is only 300 km from north to south and 150 km from east to west…. “We too had child labour at one time but in 1908 a law was passed against it and today education is totally free and compulsory for every child upto 16 years.”

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