Mukund Nawathe, custodian of the collection
The person this archive owes itself to.
Mukund Nawathe was a life member of Maharashtra Mandal London. His membership card, number LM N 008, is one of the items preserved here. It carries the Mandal's lamp emblem and the well-loved Marathi verse in praise of the language, and the simple instruction that it be produced at every function.
Over the years, Mukund Nawathe gathered and kept the Mandal's records and photographs, material that might otherwise have been lost as committees changed and decades passed. He treated these ordinary papers as what they truly are: the memory of a community. Before he passed away, he handed them on to be preserved, and this archive is the result.
Every item in this collection is held in his name. Where a photograph or a face is still unidentified, the community is warmly invited to help fill in what he began.
A photograph of Mukund Nawathe would sit well on this page, above or beside his membership card, if the family are content for one to be published. A few lines on his life in London, his years with the Mandal, and the date he passed away would let this page do more than describe the papers.
If the family would rather he were remembered only through the card and the collection itself, this page works as it stands and nothing further is needed.