nothin Hindus Celebrate Their New Home In New Haven | New Haven Independent

Hindus Celebrate Their New Home In New Haven

Allan Appel Photo

Jittendra Shah helped to preside over an offering of more than 300 varieties of food sweetened and spiced with coriander and thyme, as New Haven families hailing from the Gujarat region of western India inaugurated their new temple in West Hills with a kind of Hindu version of Thanksgiving.

Without changing any features inside or out, the Gujarati Samaj, or association of area Hindu families from Gujarat, received government permission last week to change the use of the old Belvedere on Pond Lilly Avenue from banquet hall to formal temple and Hindu community center.

So on Saturday night a festive crowd with many in colorful saris and dhotis gathered to celebrate the feast of Annakut, which follows the holiday of Diwali, the Feast of Lights.

While Shah and two Brahmin priests who recently arrived from Gujarat presided upstairs over curries and chutneys and rotis and daals that ran off into the horizon, families moved about the banquet halls downstairs eating and socializing.

Their glittering shawls and saris complemented the glassy chandeliers and wall-to-wall mirrors of the banquet rooms.

The temple is formally named the Shree Nathji Haveli. Haveli” means temple. Shree Nathji is the name of the sculpture or encapsulation of the image of Krishna, the many-faceted deity which the New Haven Hindus worship.

God takes the form of an infant,” said Mukesh Shah, a temple member who lives on Mansfield Street.

He explained that his group belongs to the Vaishnavs, a large Hindu sect that worships the image of Krishna as depicted from zero to 12 years of age.

Jettendra Shah said all of the food offerings were prepared by the two new-in-town Brahmin priests, who will be living in a house the temple owns across the street from the new temple.

(L to R) Dr. Bharat Patel, Yogesth Kamdar, Dinu Patel

Heretofore area Vaishnavs had to travel to Middletown, where there is a Vaishnav temple, but not one dedicated to Shree Nathji.

Approximately 350 to 500 Vaishnav Hindus live in Connecticut according to Yogesh Kamdar (center in photo), a financial advisor with Merrill Lynch in the financial center across from the Green.

Hasu Patel, left, and main priest Gir Dharbhai

Dinu Patel along with Yogesh Kamdar, Dr. Bharat Patel, and hasu Patel among others founded the Samaj in 1992. Dinu Patel said that Gujarati Indians began arriving in the Eastern U.S. as engineering and medical students in the early 1970s.

We saw this was a place to make a good living,” he said.

Patel, who for 12 years was executive director of the Asian American Hotel Association, said Indian-Americans own many of the hotels in New Haven and across the country.

The old Belvedere couldn’t make it in the recession as a banquet hall. The sale to temple members was a win-win, according to Hasu Patel.

Although the Brahmin priests conduct six 30-minute services a day, the temple’s uses appear to be more like a Jewish community center, with more cultural than religious trappings. The place will reflect what Dinu Patel called three central tenets of Hinduism: vegetarianism, absence of alcohol, and non-violence.

Plans for Shree Nathji Haveli include yoga and other activities for seniors; computer classes; traditional Indian dancing; and, for the youngsters, teaching of the Gujarati language.

Patel said the last is a particular concern and reason to create the center. Members see their American-born kids and grandkids not using the language.

“Here it [the Gujarati language] is going to die, unless we teach,” Patel said.

One of the priests gave a departing reporter a shining yellow and green scarf along with a bow and a blessing: Lord Krishna God is with you forever.”

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