Dr. Bella George writes – It has been a privilege for me to take over from Prof Ian Olver as President of the Australian Vellore Board in August last year. Being an alumnus of CMC, I consider it a great honour to be able to serve my Alma Mater in this way.

Ian has been a member of the Board for a total of 12 years, 3 yrs as Publicity Officer, 3yrs as Vice President and 6 yrs as President. Notable achievements during his term as President have been the setting up of fledgling FOV groups in the NT and WA, and also the redesigning of the FOV webpage, enabling on-line donations. I thank Ian very much for his leadership and for his innovative ideas.

Our current executive is made up of Vice-president- Stephen Aseervatham, who is doubling up as Publicity officer; Treasurer- Richard Caitens; and Secretary- Liz Guiver, all very experienced in the workings of the Australian Vellore Board. We will continue to work closely with the State groups and with the CMC Alumni Association of Australasia. Our links with the worldwide Friends of Vellore are also becoming easier in this electronic age and we look forward to closer working ties with them in the support of CMC.

At Vellore, many exciting changes are taking place under the leadership of Dr Sunil Chandy, Director of CMC, with developments on the main campuses and the outlying ones. Tim Nichols and his team who made the earlier video ?Home of a Healing God? went to Vellore recently made the new promotional video –  ‘Our Stories, Our CMC’. It is available now from your local branch of FOV.

Also in the pipeline is a plan for a Retirement/Assisted Living Facility for CMC faculty and staff–a project being taken up by the alumni in the USA, with hope for support from the worldwide alumni. This facility is to be built on the Bagayam campus and named after Dr Paul Brand, whose birth centenary is this year. I?m sure we will hear more about all these developments in the year ahead.

Finally, I would like to thank the State groups for their loyal support of CMC over many many years. I am aware that in some States our supporters are becoming frail, and I hope and pray that our younger generation will come forward to continue their work. May God bless us in our endeavours to partner this great institution that is CMC, and may He continue to bless the staff who work there and give of themselves selflessly day in and day out .

Bella George