With the help of the community, Chinmaya Mission Boston raised over $600,000 at its Annual Diwali Grand Banquet on November 2, 2008 towards the building expansion project.  Gopala Dwarakanath and Desh Deshpande led the initiative and thanked everyone present for their support.

In addition, festivals are usually occasions organized by communities to celebrate life. It is a special occasion for the people to meet, socialize and have fun together. Diwali is one such festival which all Indians look forward to. Over 250 people participated with agog in the Celebrations of Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights at the Wyndham Hotel, Andover.

The program commenced with a talk by Brahmacharini Bhamati Chaitanya, the resident Acharya at Chinmaya Maruti. Pundit Srinivasa Sastry, a priest at the Chinmaya Maruti since 2003, brought all the devotees together to establish a relationship with the Goddess by chanting the Lakshmi Ashtothram.  The event was well coordinated by Mr. Dwarakanath.

The center is also a fort for the young Indian-American children to learn Indian culture and heritage, Indian languages, values,music and art through various classes offered almost all days of the week. "In the last 5 years, the number of families, children, adults in satsang and fully trained teachers have increased from 75 to 330, 150 to 400, 80 to 150 and 8 to 60, respectively", said Dr. Dwarakanath, who talked about Change at the Chinmaya Maruti.

The expansion project is in order to accommodate more students and to spread the Indian values through more and more families each year. The new facilities will consists of 14 new classrooms, a spacious hallway and entry into the Maruti Mandir and a 350 seat auditorium.

Chinmaya Maruti has a dedicated team of volunteers who join hands to get things done for the mission. Volunteers included Rathna & Shankar Reddy, Pramod Kalyanasundaram, Naveen Aggarwal, and many others. It's very evident that with the great efforts of such people, our culture will be well preserved.

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