Nishkam Canada Comes To Life

By March of 2005, we got official word that Nishkam Sikh Welfare Organization had been granted official charitable status in Canada. While I joined the party late, it was a fulfilling experience to share the joy with the rest of the people at Nishkam that had pursued this objective for a long time.

On April 11, the Nishkam Canada web site, www.nishkamcanada.org went live. And once again this was due to the efforts of Gurinder Singh Rahal (http://www.xenixdesign.com/) who was by now in Calgary. I still have not met him face to face.

On April 21, we were able to get the credit card functionality going on the www.nishkamcanada.org web site. I really believe that with the credit card functionality we have leapfrogged the vast majority of the desi charity sites. The online credit card donation is made easy with www.canadahelps.org, a charity itself that was started up a by a few students in Canada. Any charity approved by the CCRA can use this credit card system to accept donations on the web for a 3% fee. www.canadahelps.org instantaneously emails out receipts for donations to online donors that can be used for tax deduction purposes for Canadian tax payers.