Around 200 guests at the Loomba Foundation's second annual Diwali dinner in New York committed to educating at least one child for a year in India. The foundation, started by London-based textile tycoon Raj Loomba to empower widows and educate their children, honoured First Lady Laura Bush and Craig Barrett, chairman of Intel Corp, at the Thursday event for their leadership in education. The Loomba Trust and Foundation -- chartered in Britain and the United States respectively -- chaired by Cherie Booth, wife of former British prime minister Tony Blair, also asked the United Nations to declare an International Day on Widows to highlight their plight as they suffer from prejudices and at places ostracism.
Talking to reporters, Intel's Barrett said the microchip giant had spent $ 100 million worldwide, including India, on education. "Over 700,000 teachers have been trained in India alone to take technology to the classroom and into the curriculum," he added. For Intel, Barrett said, India was both a big market and back office resource.Raj Loomba told reporters that he was now taking his charity -- already active in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka --to South Africa, Kenya and Uganda. "In Africa, widows whose husbands fell to AIDS face stigma and have little chance of re-marriage."
Loomba said the widow ashrams in Indian towns such as Vrindavan, Hardwar and Varanasi were symptomatic of the society ignoring them. Born in a village in Kapurthala district of Punjab, Loomba was 11 when his father died. "My mother could bring up the seven children well because of the family wealth. A hundred million widows in the world are not that lucky," he said. Lord Navnit Dholakia, one of the trustees of Loomba Trust, added that the charity had grown tremendously in just 10 years.
Source:- http://www.headlinesindia.com/archive_html/02December2007_64681.html