Planned Giving Guidance

Hindu Advocacy Group Celebrates a Decade of Service



The HAF team with Hinduism Today publisher Satguru Bodhinatha and managing editor Acharya Arumuganathaswami at the Tenth Annual DC Advocacy Days event


In 2003 in the United States the idea of Hindu advocacy was virtually unknown. But now, ten years later, this is not the case. Thanks to the efforts of the Hindu American Foundation (HAF), the concept of and need for Hindu advocacy no longer requires a lengthy introduction. Rather, the focus is on what situations are happening today affecting Hindus that most need our advocacy efforts.

June, 2013 marked their “Tenth Annual DC Advocacy Days” in which over fifty delegates representing HAF met personally with individual members of Congress. Delegates asked legislative leaders to begin a congressional letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, calling on the incoming Nawaz Sharif government of Pakistan to take steps to ease the continuing religious persecution and violence faced by Hindus, Shia and Ahmadiyya Muslims and Christians there. They also called for the House Foreign Affairs and Senate Foreign Relations Committees to host congressional hearings on the violence faced by Hindus and Buddhists in Bangladesh in the wake of recent verdicts against Islamist leaders implicated for their roles in the 1971 genocide during Pakistan’s partition. Delegates covered domestic issues, sharing Hindu perspectives on the pending immigration legislation. Each office was provided a copy of HAF’s annual Human Rights Report which details human rights violations against Hindus in ten countries.

HAF deserves a high score for consistency. Suhag Shukla, Esq., HAF’s Executive Director and Legal Counsel, said that “our government leaders are hearing from Hindu Americans in a sustained, consistent way for the last decade, and the results are showing. Our commitment to the community is to continue these efforts, expand them, and usher in a new generation of Hindu-American leaders who will make a difference in political engagement.”

HAF ‘s advocacy efforts also focus on issues that affect only a few. “When the parents of two young Hindu American boys contacted Houston, Texas community leaders for help in getting answers from school authorities about the incessant bullying their children were facing at their Humble district school, the HAF and the Hindu community rallied quickly to support the family and help find solutions to prevent recurrences.

The Hindu American Foundation has two endowments with Hindu Heritage Endowment. Hindu American Foundation Endowment (fund #75) provides general support to HAF’s work of advocating for the Hindu American community. This work includes interacting with and educating leaders in public policy, academia, media and the public at large about Hinduism and global issues concerning Hindus, such as religious liberty, the portrayal of Hinduism, hate speech, hate crimes and human rights. And the Endowment for Global Hindu Rights (fund #76) supports HAF’s efforts to highlight and correct human rights violations faced by Hindus world-wide—issues that are largely overlooked by most well-known human rights agencies. Hindus everywhere are enjoined to support HAF in this crucial work.

Learn more about these two funds and the eighty-two individual funds under the umbrella of Hindu Heritage Endowment at www.hheonline.org.

 
Kautiliya Fund

The Kautiliya Endowment

Provides youth scholarships for monastic or priest training at Kauai Aadheenam

Global Human Rights

The Endowment for Global Hindu Rights

Helps support the Hindu American Foundation's Hindu human rights efforts

Bodhinatha Fund

The Thank You Bodhinatha Fund

Helps provide free murthis to temples and gifts of religious books

Taos

The Taos Hanuman Fund

Helps preserve the Hanuman statue and assure that its worship is continued, generation after generation

Planned Giving Guidance

Community Property and Joint Tenancy: Why the Way You Hold Property Matters

Use Giving Assistant to save money and support Hindu Heritage Endowment