Luton
Namaste
How was the Luton Branch established? Well having lived in Luton for the past 20 years and always having a Samaj, I just took it as the norm.
All I knew was Luton Branch had re-formed in 1998 but I didn’ t know what had happened before that and all I could say is that we received a letter to attend a meeting in 1998. Having asked questions I’ ve learned:
In February 1975 a meeting of Prajapatis took place at a residence in Luton, where representatives from Coventry branch attended. SPA( UK) Luton was established during that meeting with Shree Dalubhai Pragjibhai Mistry as the first President and Shree Kantilal Dahyabhai Lad as the first Secretary. At that time there were about 24 known Prajapati families in Luton.
In the same year SPA( UK) was set up, and Luton joined as one of the branches. We attended SPA( UK) Pratinidhi meetings, organised activities in Luton such as coach trips, celebrated Navratri in a hired church hall, started a cricket team, purchased cricket equipment, played a few matches with local cricket teams, started playing badminton, and took part in SPA( UK) Sports tournaments etc.
This lasted for about 3 years until 1978. Gradually no Office Bearers or the Committee members had any spare time for the Samaj and Kantilal ended up doing the work of President, Secretary and Treasurer. He ended up attending all the Pratinidhi meetings all over the country taking his own car. Eventually he got exasperated as there was no interest from the Committee or the members to run the Samaj and finally in 1978 SPA Luton branch folded. All the property of the Samaj including money was handed over to SPA( UK) and the money was kept in a separate account.
Despite several attempts by SPA( UK) to revive Luton branch including proposals to make Luton Branch part of the London Branch, Luton Branch became dormant for 20 years. In 1998, SPA( UK) was to make a decision to dissolve the dormant Luton Branch and take its money into SPA( UK). At that point, the then Secretary of SPA( UK) Late Chhaganbhai Mistry requested Kantilal to take some action to save Luton’ s name being wiped out from SPA( UK).
Kantilal teamed up with Shree Thakorbhai J Mistry, Shree Navinbhai C Mistry and Shree Pravinbhai H Mistry and together they decided to take some action to revive Luton branch. They asked for support from SPA( UK) to help revive Luton Branch by attending a SPA( UK) Pratinidhi
74 vol. 41 | Prajapati Sandesh 2016