Ama Odia Parivar is the Odia community of Mumbai and Thane, organised. Members are the people who make the blood donation camps happen, who sit with a family when a child is in hospital, and who fill a hall at Ganesh Puja. Joining is how you become part of that rather than an onlooker.
What membership gives you
- A part in what we do. Camps, festivals, plantation drives and relief work are run by members. Most people join because they want to be useful, and this is the route.
- A voice in how the Society is run. Members may attend the Annual General Meeting, where the committee reports and the coming year is decided.
- A membership number and a record with the Society, so you can be recognised at events and can refer someone else when they join.
- To be found when you are needed. Members are who we call first when a family needs blood, a child needs school fees, or a hall needs setting up.
To confirm. Which rights attach to membership under the Society’s own rules — particularly who may vote at the AGM and after how long. The page says members may attend and vote because that is ordinary for a registered society, but it should say what your rules actually provide. Note also that “priority directory listing” has been removed from this page: the Yellow Pages is free to everyone and has no member tier, so promising one would have been untrue the moment somebody joined and checked.
Who can join
- Anyone from the Odia community living in Mumbai or Thane.
- You must be 18 or older. This is not a formality: the Digital Personal Data Protection Act requires verifiable consent from a parent or guardian before a child’s data may be processed, and a web form cannot honestly obtain that. Where our activities involve children, consent is taken separately and in writing.
How to join
- Fill in the form. Name, date of birth, how to reach you, and where you live. It takes a few minutes.
- A committee member reads it. We may telephone the number you give, simply to check it reaches you.
- You are issued a membership number. That is the point at which you are a member.
Nothing is automatic and nothing is published. Your details are the Society’s own record.
Membership types and fees
To confirm. Whether membership carries a fee, and whether there are different classes of member — the spec suggests Life, Annual, Student and Patron. Nothing is published here because nothing has been decided, and a fee shown on this page is one the Society would be held to. The application form currently takes a single kind of membership and collects no payment, so if classes are introduced the form needs a field for them and this page needs a comparison table. Applying today costs nothing.
Questions people ask
Does it cost anything?
Not today. There is no payment step in the application and the Society is not taking payments through this website yet. If a fee is introduced it will be stated here before it applies to anyone.
How long does it take?
Ama Odia Parivar is run by volunteers alongside their own work, so please allow a few days. We do not send an automatic confirmation email, so keep a note of when you applied. If you have heard nothing after a couple of weeks, write to us and we will chase it.
What happens to my details?
They are not published on this website — not your name, not your phone number, not your address. We hold them to process your membership and to contact you about the Society, and we do not pass them to anyone else. Our Privacy Policy sets out how to see, correct or delete them.
Can I change my mind?
Yes, at any point and without giving a reason. Write to us and we will remove your record. Withdrawing does not affect anything lawfully done beforehand.
Someone told me to mention their name
The form has a Referred by box for their membership number. It is optional, and leaving it blank does not count against you.
I live outside Mumbai and Thane
The form asks for a locality within Mumbai or Thane, because that is where the Society works and where members are called on. If you are Odia and elsewhere and would still like to help, tell us — there is usually something.
What members say
To confirm. Three or four short quotes from real members, with their name and how long they have been part of the Society. Two lines each is enough. This is the section that persuades someone hovering over the form, and it is the one section on this page nobody but a member can write. Please do not let anyone compose them on a member’s behalf.
Ready?
Applying takes a few minutes and commits you to nothing until the committee has reviewed it and you have been given a membership number.