This inspiration to do good all the times, He instilled not merely to Ananda Marga workers and Margiis but to all the people around Him. With this motto in mind, He wanted us to be torchbearers in our service activities to the afflicted in their moment of distress. He wanted that Ananda Marga and its relief section, AMURT should be the frontrunners with maximum service to the humanity and this too with least infrastructure or overhead costs.

It is with this inspiration AMURT worked in all calamities and we used to see our Beloved Guru’s deep concern for the affected in every disaster, whether it is natural or man-made.

We all have seen the nature’s fury in the recent Tsunami earthquake on the fateful day of 26th Dec. 2004 when mighty waves of the ocean swept away hundreds of thousands of people and properties. The catastrophe is very nightmarish and beyond description or comprehension. The earthquake occurred in the early hours of 26th morning in the ocean at a place in between Indonesia and Andaman & Nicobar Islands of India. Many countries of Asia and Africa suffered serious loss of lives and properties but the brunt of destruction took place in Indonesia and Nicobar Islands. Several hundreds of thousands of people died and a good number are missing in both these countries and a time came that Governments stopped counting the dead or missing. One can imagine the fate of people that even after 45 days they are found surviving in lonely islands where there is no habitation, all alone with nothing to eat with a threatening sea in face and God above to protect. Still there is scope of recovering people if efforts are made.

Our Beloved Spiritual Master and the founder of Ananda Marga posted our workers in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands since 1966 and today we have 17 schools in various islands, master units (Social Welfare Projects) and other activities. 12 monks and 4 nuns and a battery of LFT workers are working to do more and more services in these Islands which are 1250 kms away from the mainland. Right after the Tsunami struck the Islands with all its ferocity, the immediate concern of all was the safety and survival of the workers and the members. It is just by the divine Grace of Beloved Master that all of them survived. One monk who was garlanding the Picture of Guru on the fateful morning saw a 20 feet high waves struck him and he has no other way except to cling to the Picture for protection and truly the Lord saved him. But the school building was washed away. Like the story of Casablanca who stood at the mast of the sinking ship obeying his father’s command, our dadas (monks) and didis (nuns) never left their place of postings and stayed on there and started relief work clearing the dead bodies and cremating them with due honour and providing food, sanitation, medical assistance and spiritual counselling for the survivors.

The Kolkata Central administrative body of AMURT sent one team of workers to Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu and another team to Port Blair, Andaman. The teams are doing commendable work and received wide appreciation from the Government, media and general public. Huge consignments of goods like beaten rice, molasses, potatoes, lanterns, mosquito curtains, clothes for women and children, soaps and note books were sent from mainland by ships to Port Blair for onward transportation to the southern islands which was inhabited by tribals normally not open to the civil administration. The Government gave us passes and special ships to do relief work there. The Federal Government agencies of India seeing our service activities have also extended all sorts of help including free passage for dadas (monks) and didis (nuns) and goods. Many well known organizations like Oxfam, Action–aid, Rotary International, World Vision, Bharat Sevashram Samgha have wholeheartedly joined hands with our AMURT workers by providing relief materials. Rotary International alone have delivered to us about 25 tons of goods for distribution and one Rotary Governor from Bangalore who visited Port Blair was all praise for our workers. The only English Newspaper in Port Blair published by the Government there was all praise for our sincere services and the certificates of appreciation issued by the senior officers of Government speak volumes for the work done by AMURT. A third consignment of new cooking utensils and potatoes are about to leave the mainland to Port Blair in the next week.

Acarya Mantreshananda Avadhuta
Acarya Navodbhasananda Avadhuta
Acarya Naranarayananda Avadhuta
Acarya Ciranjayananda Avadhuta
Acarya Sureshananda Avadhuta
Acarya Anupamananda Avadhuta
Acarya Vitendrananda Avadhuta
Acarya Dayadiishananda Avadhuta
Acarya Nityamuktananda Avadhuta
Acarya Saumyasundarananda Avadhuta
Acarya Pavanananda Avadhuta
Acarya Arindamananda Avadhuta
Acarya Atmabodhananda Avadhuta
Avadhutika Ananda Nityamukta Acarya
Avadhutika Ananda Vandiita Acarya
Avadhutika Ananda Sudhiira Acarya
Avadhutika Ananda Vimukta Acarya

The Government officials were highly appreciative of our work. Now they are requesting us to take up some reconstruction of houses for the affected families to give shelter to the surviving members of the family.

As it is an earthquake prone area any construction should be done with only steel sheets on the top and wood or light bricks as wall. Any such house with a bedroom and verandah and a bathroom and toilet roughly costs Rs. 75,000 or roughly 1400 Euros. It is in blocks of 50 and 100 that the Government is expecting the Non Governmental Organizations to take up. If we take up a project of reconstruction of 50 houses it roughly costs us Rs.3,750,000 that means roughly 70000 Euros. We request all to help in the reconstruction programme so that the poor people can build their lives afresh.

We have the website of our service activities on the website www.amurtworld.org Kindly log on to our website to see the pictures of the relief work and also appreciation letters.

Any help for any individual or company from any country can be sent to us to through any Bank to our account: Ananda Marga Pracharaka Samgha Tsunami Relief Account, Current Account No. 2619, Vijaya Bank, 125/1, A.G.Towers, Park Street, Kolkata-700017. (India), Swift code: VIJBAN BBOSC

For any information, please contact Acarya Sutiirthananda Avadhuta on the Tel: (+91-33) 2345 1274 or by email: sutiirthananda@hotmail.com; cos@amps-net.org; info@amurtworld.org

Port Blair (Andaman & Nicober Islands) contact details: Acarya Mantreshananda Avadhuta on mobile number: +919434281407 or Tel.(+91-3192) 233468