New Dhamma fundraising for India

FWBO Dhammaloka is probably not a well-known name to most practitioners in the FWBO. But that might be about to change…

Dhammaloka means 'Realm of the Dhamma', or 'The Land of the Teaching of the Buddha', and FWBO Dhammaloka is a UK charity dedicated to helping Indian people revive Buddhism and Buddhist values - compassion, wisdom, and equality of opportunity - all across India.

Although the charity has been registered for some time it was almost-dormant until May this year, when it registered an internet fundraising account with JustGiving – and now, only four months later, they have just celebrated raising their first £10,000 ($18,000) for Dhamma projects in India.

Lokabandhu told FWBO News “Dhammaloka has no full-time or even part-time staff – just the charity trustees, who are all busy elsewhere - so from the first we adopted a decentralised strategy of facilitating the fundraising efforts of others rather than trying to do it all themselves.

“This paid off very quickly, with over a dozen pages registered under Dhammaloka’s name on justgiving, each describing a different Dhamma project in India. Although they span a wide range of projects, and are all run by different teams in different parts of the country, they are all under TBMSG’s overall umbrella. Each of the fundraising pages was then promoted – often from India itself – by those directly committed to the project, with Dhammaloka providing a backup role of adviser and quality guarantor. And within four months, £10,000 had been donated!”

You can see a complete list of Dhammaloka’s JustGiving appeals here, including the forthcoming 'jumbo retreats' in Bodh Gaya and Amaravati; Vimalabhumi (a planned South Indian retreat centre), the Buddha Festival, and more.

Dhammaloka's own donations page is here www.justgiving.com/fwbodhammaloka - donations made here will be allocated by Dhammaloka’s trustees according to need.

Future plans include their first sponsored event, which will be a world-wide all-night meditation in aid of NNBY, India’s new National Network of Buddhist Youth. This has set itself a target of raising £5,000 through gathering over 100 sponsored meditators from all FWBO and TBMSG centres worldwide, the plan is to promote the event almost exclusively through the burgeoning FWBO, TBMSG, and NNBY presences on social-networking sites such as Facebook and Orkut. You can take part in this by meditating (pledge to do so here) or donating here - www.justgiving.com/fullmoonmeditation.

And check Facebook or Orkut for more…