ZSO expansion plans

According to the "Quick facts” published by the ZSO Building Capital Campaign Committee (BCCC) chaired by Dr Dhun Noria, their prayer room is expected to increase from 930 sq ft to 1,950 sq ft, the assembly hall will increase from the present 2,400 sq ft to 5,040 sq ft, if their plans proceed as envisaged. This would augment seating capacity from 350 to 916 persons accommodated theater style or from 220 to 672 persons banquet style without liquor or from 200 to 492 persons with liquor. The larger assembly hall will have the facility of subdivision by partitions to accommodate several simultaneous activities.

The main bugbear, parking, will rise from 114 cars to 150 cars. It may be noted that both numbers include 66 cars parked on the street.

A series of fundraisers have livened the ZSO activity list for 2003, according to the BCCC update: A delicious buffet plus three decades of music tradition starting with Cliff Richards and ending with Freddie Mercury was billed as "The British Invasion” by organizer Soli Pestonji in February with more shows promised later in the year. A play, Remember Me, and buffet dinner was sold out in March and repeated in May and August. A Parsi lagannoo bhonu on banana leaves was a sold out event in April. The Building Capital Campaign was formally launched on May 9 with the unveiling of the conceptual drawing of the new Darbe-Meher plus a short natak (farce). June saw the organization of the ZSO Golf Classic. The community will be looking forward to an Indian Music Night, Seniors Food Fair, a Garas and Tiaras gala and a New Year’s Eve Dinner Dance in the latter half of the year.

In addition to the sale of raffle tickets and 15-month tri-calendars (Shahen­shahi, Kadmi and Fasli) created by Adi Dastur and Edul Kanga and funded by the Noria family, ZSO has joined All Communcations Inc (ACN), a provider of public utilities in North America which offers competitive long distance phone services. ZSO is to receive eight percent of the monthly long-distance phone bills of customers acquired by ACN through ZSO. The arrangement is expected to continue "long after our capital campaign is completed and the new Darbe-Meher a reality,” notes Noria’s message to the community.

A group of Zoroastrian realtors who have joined together as the Support Alliance Group have pledged 10 percent of their net earnings from Zoroastrian clients to the BCC. Their pledges run to December 31, 2005 or until the BCC reaches its target of raising $ 2.2 million. The first to join the group include Sarosh Bharucha, Sam Vesuna, Pervez Daroga, Themton Irani, Nilufer Mama, Hosie Mancherjee, Shahnaz Polad and Nidhi Thaker but admission to the group is open. "It would be heartwarming to see other professionals set up similar support alliance groups,” notes Noria hopefully.