Star studded speakers at 28th Rotary Conference

The only service organisation in the world to have a permanent seat in the United Nations General Assembly – Rotary, will be featuring the 28th conference for district 3220 (covering Sri Lanka and Maldives) on 5 and 6 April with an array of star studded speakers highlighting the need for humanity in the world. 

“What is unique about this year’s conference is that we globally are becoming more corporate in nature and now we lead Rotary just like a corporate with clear objectives, strategies and KPIs,” said Governor Rotary Sri Lanka and Maldives Dushan Soza. Soza hails from a corporate background and was the CEO of a top IT/BPO company. “It’s great that we have some outstanding personalities this year saying yes to humanity,” he said.

The event will be represented by the Rotary International President Representative Brenda M. Cressey who is currently the Vice Chair of the Rotary Foundation Trustees. Brenda is a recipient of the RI ‘Service Above Self Award’, The Rotary Foundation’s ‘Citation for Meritorious Service’, and the prestigious Distinguished Service Award. Outside Rotary was honoured to be nominated as one of President George H.W. Bush’s ‘1000 Points of Light’, which recognises those individuals who are making a difference through their volunteer service. She was also awarded Maine Public Broadcasting System’s ‘Jefferson Award for Meritorious Service’, and bestowed with the ‘State of Maine Governor Award for Community Service’. She was honoured as a two-time recipient of the American Cancer Society Volunteer of the Year Award.

Then we have the second largest donor for Rotary global Ravishankar who donated 2.5 billion rupees recently to Rotary who will talk on ‘Give till it hurts, when it’s uncomfortable’. Ravishanka is a real investor tycoon from India and he pleasantly shocked the whole world by donating to the Rotary Foundation this year Indian Rs. 1 billion which is equivalent to giving away Sri Lanka Rs. 2.5 billion which according to him is 70% of his wealth. He became the second single largest giver to the Rotary Foundation in its history after Bill Gates. Most recently he gave away his Mercedes car which had done only 3,000 km for an auction with all proceeds to go to Rotary Foundation.

Cricketing legend Kumar Sangakkara joins the forum to talk about ‘My Story’ which cuts across his cricketing background to now into philanthropy and what he wants to do in the future. Whilst Alston Koch will be talking about his life as a singer and now Hollywood actor and being a Tourism ambassador to Sri Lanka which makes the conference unique, said Chairman of PR for Rotary Sri Lanka and Maldives Dr. Rohantha Athukorala.

The other two amazing Speakers that Sri Lanka Rotarians will get exposed to are Rajeev Puri and Dr. Peter Chee. 

Rajeev Puri is a well-known Management and Motivational Speaker. He has held senior leadership positions like vice president and has been associated with some of the top international corporates like Avery India Ltd., Larsen & Toubro Ltd., Kinetic Motors and the Tata Group of companies in the field of sales, training and business management.

Dr. Peter Chee is the President and CEO of ITD World, a leading multinational corporation for Human Resource Development. With Dr. Chee’s leadership contribution for over 30 years, ITD World has established itself as a global learning solutions expert.