Dear Readers,

We, the joint editors, are very excited to present to you shatam the Centenary Yearbook of our beloved centennial club.

shatam started out as a seemingly casual conversation CYP Purnendu and we had in April 2020, when he cleverly and royally tricked us into agreeing to compile, edit and bring out this unique anthology as homage to our centenary year.

Before we knew it, the book was growing like Japanese honeysuckle, twisting vines over everything in its path! Writings, content, information blitz and editorial planning sprouted tendrils and started growing together almost too quickly to see. Within a few weeks, we were hurtling along on a rollercoaster ride.

We know how protective you feel about the club that you love, and we respect that. Especially a discerning, serious readership like yours. We spent hours agonising over how to intensify the experience of savouring a centenary book about our club. We had a desire to create the best, most stylish, innovative and authentic publication of its kind.

Every tiny aspect of this book represents a decision we debated, sweated over and second-guessed until we ran out of time and had to send it off to the printer. Our aim was to provide you with a nostalgic, yet sharp, clear and dynamic view of this historic year — while not altering the underlying ethos  of our organisation.

This centenary issue is a look at our lineage and the whirlwind journey that our club has undertaken this year. We have included some wonderful writings from our members. We made a conscious decision to personally connect with every person within these pages and we respect all of them for their contribution towards making our yearbook better, brighter, more authentic.

As you leaf through the pages, you will notice that we have created capsules each headlined in Sanskrit, Sanskrit being one of the foundation pillars of the Indian cultural ethos. We also decided to encourage Rotarians to laugh at  themselves, and so have included snippets of humour here and there.

Needless to say, we had NO idea how big this thing would get! The past few weeks have been delicious and serendipitous, and at times, really, really hard but never have we believed in something so much and not once did we want to quit. In our enthusiasm, if we have missed out in including any pertinent content, we apologise in advance for the same.

Our words of thanks will forever remain incomplete. Hats off to our Centenary President Purnendu Roychowdhury who trusted us completely and vetted our every decision. Never once did he interfere in or override our wishes. President Debashis Mitra supported us fully with his constant, barely-concealed enthusiasm.

Heartfelt thanks go out to Centenary Secretary Anusua Das, Rtn. Bodhi Brata Das, Rtn. Debasish Biswas & Green Badger Arindam Roychowdhury without whose timely inputs we would have been unable to meet deadlines. Centenary First Lady Sucharita was a steady source of inspiration, and First Lady Sambi Mitra was always ready to help. The support given to us by these wonderful people is tremendous and noteworthy.

shatam began as a dream and quickly took on a life of its own. As we are about to hit the ‘print’ button, we are reflecting on the magnitude of what we have created. We feel extraordinarily proud to be part of such a soulful and heartfelt journey. More passion you would be hard-pressed to find.

Above all, thank you, dear contributors and staff for throwing in with us—and you, our first readers, for making it all real. You are a part of our team now and we look forward to walking the journey with you. We want and will welcome your feedback and input.

With warm regards,