ISP Bangalore Bureau
Most of us agree that the pandemic has changed the way we approach life and work. But here is a business baron who has changed the way he managed his priorities after his Corona-time experience. Denny Thomas Chempazha, a well established and successful entrepreneur of Kerala has given up on his corporate work to promote sustainable Indian ways of living.
“I call it Personal Social Responsibility or PSR. We all owe our bit to make this world a better place to live. I decided to make it a purpose for the rest of my life. The way we are living today is not a feasible one for the earth. One more pandemic-like situation and the whole system may break down. We already saw a lot of it happening in the last two years,” says Denny, who is now documenting and researching age-old rural living systems.
Chempazha is the founder of Santa Monica Group which was majorly into study abroad and other educational services. He also owned a flourishing trade in hospitality, travels and farm sector before he gave it all up and ventured into sustainability studies and promotion of indigenous healthy practices.
As a pandemic striked and everyone was forced to remain indoors, Chempazha took special permission to travel to Uttarakhand and learn from the villagers the secrets of healthy living. He stayed discreetly in a village and learned the age-old educational ways and health practices. As lockdown eased down, he worked along with rural folks for livelihood and learned to live with meagre resources. He sold vegetables in the nearby towns for a living and spent days and days with the elders and community members as a student.
“I found the villagers in India much happier and content. They have so much to give to the world. But most of these sustainable living practices are not documented and not available for the world to take note of. As a first step, I decided to give up my corporate life and handover the businesses to my long standing companions and plunged myself into researching and archiving India’s rich sustainable practices for the world to learn,” says Denny Chempazha.
Apart from Ayurveda, Siddha, Naturopathy, Yoga and other therapies, rarely has any living patterns of Indian households and village systems been documented or talked about in world platforms, says Denny adding that it is a huge task and he has found in his journey many individuals who think like he does. He believes that the sustainable Indian model of living will be a global phenomenon soon. His wife is a partner in arms in his mission and leads his flagship movement called Amrithagiri Ecolife in Kerala which promotes kitchen gardens and chemical free living.
“We have imparted happiness and light of knowledge to the world since the days of Nalanda and Takshashila. Currently, we as a nation are reviving that leadership role. The rise of yoga is one example, many more are to come. The beacon of global sustenance is in the villages of India,” says Denny who these days is travelling across India meeting rural communities.
The business magnet turned sustainability champion feels the urgent need is to impart and instill the idea of giving back to nature more than what we take from it. He says from the agricultural practices to food habits, family systems to rural social structure, everything in India is worth a lesson for the world to learn if it is researched and documented objectively.
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