North American Awards

Six outstanding North American Zara-thushtis were recognized for their personal achievements and community contributions at the 13th North American Congress held in San Jose, December 29, 2004 to January 1, 2005. Led by former FEZANA (Federation of Zoroast­rian Associations of North America) president Framroze Patel, the awardees included Dr Lovji and Mehru Cama, all of ZAGNY (Zoroast­rian Association of Greater New York), Dr Dhun Noria of Ontario, Farobag Cooper of Chicago, Susan Karani of New York, and Boman Irani of Florida at the awards ceremony lunch on December 30.

The contribution of the late Dinshaw Joshi who had chaired the FEZANA Awards Committee since 1990 until his demise in 2003, imparting professional, objective and consistent criteria to the awards, was gratefully recalled on the occasion. A trophy and plaque presented to Joshi were accepted by his wife Goolcher and daughter Shehernaz Joshi-Verahrami, notes a report by Yasmin Pavri in Manashni, the newsletter of the Zoroastrian Association of Houston. Pavri, a long standing member of the Awards Commit­tee, has succeeded Joshi to the chair.

Chartered accountant Patel is said to have looked upon "community service as part of being a Zarathushti.” One of the founding members of ZAGNY and founder trustee of the Darbe Mehr Zoroastrian Temple in New Rochelle, New York, he has served the local and North American community for well nigh three decades. He continues to accept responsibility for the filing of tax returns for these New York institutions. But he has also been involved with FEZANA since its inception and held positions on its executive board from 1990 to 2002, starting as treasurer, serving as vice president and retiring after a four year tenure as president, as notes the citation forwarded by Pavri. And through the long years of service, the soft-spoken Patel has "managed through friendly persuasion and persistence, to bring together larger gatherings of religious and community conferenc­es,” adds the citation. Patel was presented the Rohinton Rivetna Outstanding Zarathushti Award, named after the founding president of FEZANA.

The "elegant, enthusiastic and enterprising” Noria, as the citation describes her, received the Excellence in Business or Profession Award. A woman of many parts, not least as fund-raiser within the Zoroastrian and wider host communities, Noria "focuses her energy to commitment and excellence in her professional life, her business, her devotion to her family and friends and by her extensive voluntary activities to help the community of Toronto at large.” An anatomic pathologist, Noria is said to have ob­tained her fellowship in the discipline and begun laboratory services at the Scarborough Grace Hospital. "Within three years of coming to Canada Noria was elected to the faculty council of the University of Toronto to represent the interests of the medical interns and residents of Ontario,” notes the citation. Recognizing the need for a medical building for the physicians’ offices, Noria co-opted a couple of business partners to con­struct a modern medical building close to the Hospital ­— the Scarborough North Medical Arts Building — which has won an award as the best professional building in its genre. As owner and medical director of Eglinton Diagnostic Laboratory and of the Eglinton Medical Laboratory she provides diagnostic facilities and blood and body fluid testing. She also owns and operates four other medically related businesses. Noria’s managerial responsi­bilities include membership of the Hospital’s board of directors and of its foundation board with a mandate to raise $ 67 million for the Emergency and Critical Care Wing. Simultaneously she serves on the board of the Yee Hong Center of Geriatric Care and, as chair of the Building Capital Campaign Committee of the Zo­roastrian Society of Ontario, has successfully raised $ 1.3 mil­lion within two years, notes the citation

The Jamshed Pavri Humanitarian Service Award was presented to the Camas. Named in honor of the caring, giving founder and former president of the Zoroastrian Society of British Columbia, the award honors some of the most outstanding community workers in North America. "Lovji’s involvement with the community started long before the tri-states’ Zarathushti community was formally organized as the Zoroastrian Association of Greater New York. Even during his student days at Columbia he was an active member of the group of Zarathushtis who met informally under the leader­ship of Erach Munshi,” records the citation. His youth related activities began with the first religious classes in the New York Area in 1973 — barely missing five classes in 30 years — and continues to teach Zoroastrian history, culture, philosophy and religion to children aged 10-15. He also organizes summer camps for the youth.

Volunteering her services to the community whenever there was need, Mehru played a major role in the organization of the 11th North American Congress. She participated actively in the site selection and fund-raising efforts for the new Darbe Mehr in Pomona, helped the fund-raising committee collect $ 750,000 in under three months. The couple works for the Udvada Atash Behram Fund founded by Munshi, which collects donations for Iranshah and the poor priestly families of Udvada, Surat and Navsari. "Mehru’s passion has always been helping others, most particu­larly children in need,” notes the citation recording her invol­vement with the wider human community, organizing food, clothing and school supply drives.

Music Director of the Chicago Philharmonia since 1985, Cooper is the artistic director of the Chicago Performing Arts Series and principal conductor of its resident professional ensemble, the Mostly Mozart Chamber Players and the Camerata Virtuosi. "The Illinoi Bureau of Tourism has featured Cooper and the Camerata Virtuosi through television commercials that have been aired throughout the North American continent,” states the citation. Apart from his symphonic repertoire, Cooper is said to be a skilled interpreter of Baroque literature, has performed on the piano at Carnegie Recital Hall and participated in over 100 performances with the Metropolitan Opera in New York city. Coop­er’s penchant for encouraging artistic interest among younger members of his community led to the founding of the Zoroastrian Symphony Orchestra which offers a unique mixture of young and seasoned professionals performing side by side. With its success­ful debut at the Seventh World Zoroastrian Congress in Houston and subsequent performances in Chicago, this Cooper creation is expected to star at the eighth Congress in London in June. Cooper was awarded the new rotating trophy for Excellence in Performing Arts, Painting or Literature donated by the Joshi and Verahrami families in memory of Dinshaw Joshi.

The Outstanding Young Zarathushti Award was presented to Susan Karani who is "on her way to becoming a rising scholar of Zoroastrian studies and a human rights advocate.” An honors graduate in political science and international studies from the University of Chicago, she had accessed its intensive language programs to take courses at the Université Européene in Tours, France, and at the Université de Paris, La Sorbonne, Paris. Thereafter she completed her masters in human rights studies from Columbia, completing her thesis on "Women in Zoroastrian law: Sassanian Persia,” and is now pursuing an MA/PhD program in Iranian studies on full scholarship at the Department of Near Eastern studies at the University of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Apart from scholastic and legal research Karani has contributed to the FEZANA-UN delegation for the last two to three years, attend­ing the UN-NGO conferences as well as those of the Commission on the Status of Women.

The Outstanding Zarathusti Student Award went to Bombay born Boman Irani who is currently working on aspects of obesity for his doctorate in medicinal chemistry at the University of Florida at Gainesville. The citation describes him as an "extremely personable, energetic and intelligent individual who will clearly be an outstanding independent researcher in biomedical sciences...(He) not only excels in the classroom and laboratory but he has also been very active in the Gainesville community as an active member of the Indian Students Association and has led free health checkups for the (local) residents for the past four years.” Irani became the first winner of the new Shirin Nariman Dastoor rotating trophy for the student award donated by the lady’s family in her memory.

The evaluation criteria, specific to each award, provides for 100 maximum points distributed over such yardsticks as achievements and recognition in North America and world wide, peer recognition, professional attainments, humanitarian service etc. A panel of judges — generally unknown to each other — eva­luate the nominees according to these clearly marked criteria, ensuring unbiased results: a product of Joshi’s painstaking institutionalization of procedure.