Browsing: Chandrika Tandon

When Chandrika Tandon first came to America at the age of 24 to interview for a job at McKinsey& Company, she had no American degree and no green card. She did not even own a western outfit, interviewing in a sari and chappals, wearing a borrowed coat. Yet within a few years she went on to become a partner at this prestigious company, the first Indian-American woman to be selected.

If you’re wondering what the Secret Garden is, and where it is,  it is Children’s Hope India’s annual gala and it was held on October 7 at Pier Sixty in Manhattan. The theme of this much anticipated fundraiser for the education of under-served children was based on the classic children’s novel ‘The Secret Garden’ by Frances Hodgson Burnett which shows how love and compassion can transform the lives of children.

It seems wholly appropriate that Grammy-nominated artist Chandrika Tandon has released the first track of her new album Shivoham – the Quest, in August, the month of Ganesh Chaturthi, the birth of the beloved God of New Beginnings.

Cocktails and Conversation with Chandrika Tandon was a small informal event organized by CHI’s junior board CH2 through which young professionals get started in helping the less privileged and creating a future for them through education.

I-Phone, I-Pad, I-Meditate?

It was bound to happen! The practice of meditation may be thousands of years old but it is perfectly suited to our very stressful modern times, when in order to go fast, you have to learn to slow down. And the buzz of the moment is that the power of social media is being harnessed by a group of high achieving young professionals to get the word out about the value of meditation, and the upcoming I Meditate NY event, one of the largest meditation gatherings ever to be held in the Big Apple.

Over 2700 New Yorkers, from all walks of life and all religions, will come together to listen to and meditate with the renowned spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar who heads the Art of Living Foundation, with music by Grammy nominated Chandrika Tandon and world music band Bhakti. This unique event will be held at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall on April 10, and leading up to it are free meditation classes at the Art of Living Center in Manhattan, a chance to get a first-hand taste of meditation.

I interviewed Chandrika Tandon for The Wall Street Journal just before the Grammy Awards and asked her for her thoughts on the Prize.
“That’s not the way I think of my life; I don’t think of winning or losing. I think of the Grammys as a happening at a point in time. I’m not trying to use this as a stepping stone to something else. I live by the words of the mystic Kabir:

‘When ‘I’ was there, the Divine was missing.

When ‘I’ left, the Divine took over. ‘

So the quest is to lose myself and go with the flow.”

She spoke about her childhood, her passion for music and how the worlds of business and art intersect. You can read the full interview at The Wall Street Journal

Chandrika Krishnamurthy Tandon, the dynamic chairman of Tandon Capital Associates, who has done major restructuring surgeries in the global financial world, is executive-in-residence at New York University Stern, a member of the board of overseers of New York’s Stern School of Business, a member of the President’s Council of International Activities at Yale University, and an arts patron.
There’s more: she has the voice of an angel. ‘Om Namo Narayanaya’ is the chant that will calm and strengthen you. Newsbreak: Soul Call has just been nominated for a Grammy in the Best Contemporary World Music Album category

What happens when you manage to gather critical thinkers like Indra Nooyi, PepsiCo’s Chairman and CEO, the many faceted Fareed Zakaria, Kapil Sibal, India’s Union Minister for Human Resource Development and Richard C. Levin, President of Yale University all in the same room?

You get some thought-provoking conversation about where India is going, and the challenges along the way.

What is India doing right – and what is it doing wrong? Can it beat China? And what about privatizing public works to fix the infrastructure? Will India have enough teachers? What about the health challenge?

So come be a fly on the wall and listen to where India is headed.

President Clinton certainly has the charisma to get pin-drop silence in a room. He was at the Hilton Hotel for the American India Foundation Annual Spring Awards Gala and over 400 heavy hitters from the Indian community turned up.