Page 7 - Here and Now June 2022

My Pune ISABS group experience

Kiran Lalsangi

I did my phase A in 2011 and I got a recommendation to do one more advanced lab. In my ISABS journey
it was not easy to accept and work on different feedbacks. To work on beliefs around religion, caste, class
and gender was challenging to say the least. I found it difficult to see various patterns and human
processes and work on feedback after the labs. My mentor Sridhar Kshirsagar supported me throughout
and helped me to work through these challenges.

I was struggling to explore and work through almost continuously. In this process I was looking for
opportunities (in Pune where I live) to consistently keep working on myself. In those days Prerana Rane
was managing and coordinating the ISABS western region. I saw that they conducted monthly meetings
in Mumbai. These meetings had some professional members along with different people at different
stages in the journey of ISABS. I wished to attend a few meetings but couldn’t, as it was impractical to
travel to Mumbai every month only for these brief meetings, also given the fact that I was also working
for a living. One day, I called up Prerana and asked if some of these meetings she was holding could be
done in Pune. I told her I have other ISABians like Tina Ratra and Prachi Kelkar in Pune who would also be
interested.

Prerana said – “well, if you have Aroon Joshi and Rahul Joshi, two professional members , why don’t you
hold those meetings there?” I initiated a conversation with Aroon and asked him if we could conduct
monthly meetings in Pune. He immediately agreed to conduct such meetings at his home. After a few
days, Tina Ratra whom I knew from Phase-A and two other members Amit dhabi and Vinita Saxena from
Panchgani, also pursuing their ISABS journey, decided to join our group at the formative stage. So, Tina,
Amit, Rahul, Vinita and me that was our group agreed to meet at Aroon’s place on the 25 September
2016. However, due to a rally in Pune on that day and other reasons that rendered travel difficult, we
thought that the meeting would have to be cancelled. But I was the only person who despite everything
wanted to go to Aroon’s place. I presumed that since I am the only one, Aroon may not be interested in a

7