Kanara Welfare Trust

It was way back in 1953, that the Kanara Welfare Trust made a tryst with destiny. We are proud that Kanara Welfare Trust has completed 64 years of its useful and fruitful existence. Founder Chairman late Dr.Dinkar Desai wrote in one of his epigrams –

The message of the Trust is very clear. Service is endless. Kanara Welfare Trust is nothing but humanism of Dr.Dinkar Desai personified. Thousands of beneficiaries of the trust living in different places of the District and also outside look up to it with a deep sense of gratitude and wish.

Magnificent buildings, laboratories, libraries, and beautiful gardens hold out proof of the development and activities of the Trust. It should be remembered that the Trust is something more than a collection of bricks and stones. It is a living and growing organisation. Thousands of well-wishers, philanthropic donors, admirers and not to speak of countless beneficiaries constitute this mighty organisation.

By and large, Kanara Welfare Trust has been able to achieve what is contained in the preamble. Observing the manifold activities of the Trust an eminent person exclaimed, “The Trust by its significant service has almost established a University in the District of North Kanara”. Today we have a network of Institutions all over the District. It has to its credit 45 Institutions – 3 Degree colleges, 2 PG Centres, 7 Junior Colleges, 17 High Schools, and other Social Service Institutions. It was started with a meager amount of Rs.6000/- collected by the Raith Community and now the assets are more than 15 crores excluding the land. The family of the Trust is growing day by day and there has been a significant increase in the number of students. Total enrolment is about 12000. All these have been possible because of the careful and judicious management of the Trust.

The saga of Kanara Welfare Trust is the saga of the sacrifice of one individual – Dr.Dinkar Desai – who was our great torchbearer and lent us all help to keep this torch burning and spread the light into the farthest corners of the District. Since the death of Dr. Desai in 1982, the present Chairman, ShriS.P.Kamat is contributing his mite to keep the torch bright and blazing aloft. He is ably assisted by the other Trustees. The Trust has been conducting fresh and feasible experiments in the welfare of the people of this district from time to time under his dynamic leadership.

Kanara Welfare Trust is indeed an institution with a difference. Being rooted in the rural background of Uttar Kannada District, it has to balance the aspirations of the rural people and the modern requirements. Education is no more and it should not be anymore a mere acquisition of knowledge for eking out a livelihood. It has a deeper meaning and a loftier purpose. The formal curriculum prescribed needs be blended with methods of arousing latent potentialities in the child, enabling it to realise its own strength. The wholesome development of the personality of a child leading it to higher levels of understanding should be the purpose of education.

Today, India needs to be imbued with a new dynamism which calls for young men and women to shed off the shackles of small ideas, small means, small pleasures, and small aims and be motivated to think and achieve higher goals in every walk of life. Education is the instrument through which alone this purpose could be achieved. This has been the motto of Kanara Welfare Trust.

Kanara Welfare Trust has completed 64 years of its existence. This institution is an expression of creative thought that germinated in a creative mind in a state of contemplation. Though this creative mind appears to be always in flux and agitation influenced by the apparent shortcomings and deficiencies in the external system, in its deeper recesses there lies a lofty ideal, and a thought focussed on the possibility of overcoming these deficiencies and shortcomings experienced by the superficial mind. Dr.Dinkar Desai’s life is an example to show how creativity within can find its expression to meet the challenges of a given time. The Trust which has its humble beginning has today grown into a magnificent institution cherishing its own ideals and principles, and, in the process of providing life-sustaining strength to thousands of young boys and girls in the form of formal education. This is the contribution of late, Dr.Dinkar Desai, to nation-building in the correct perspective.

The role of the Trust in shaping the new generations, fired by the spark of awareness of noble ideals, has been great. The Trust has the ability and perseverance to carry out this great responsibility. The Trust has been conducting fresh, feasible experiments in the welfare of rural development for six decades. We look forward to the wholehearted co-operation of the people and hope that the ceaseless endeavor of the Trust may bear myriads of fruits in the years to come.

• To carry out and promote educational, cultural, social and material advancement of the people, particularly of the backward and poorer classes, within the Uttar Kannada District.
• To impart education and knowledge, especially by establishing and maintaining educational institutions and hostels, including schools for imparting education in the District.
• To do all such things as are incidental or conducive to the attainment of the above objects.