Brief history of OCCI:
It was in the year 2011 Karnataka Od community officers Sri Shivarudraiahswamy then Income tax officer of Bengaluru and Sri T Chandrasekhar Deputy Director of Korea Trade Centre in Bangalore conceptualised to foundation of All India level organisation of Od Bhovi community basing in New Delhi with an objective to bring the all India scattered Od community in different names , different language segments to one national forum in one common name as Od.
It's historical fact that the community had moved all India and was also ex parted beyond Indian territories to build temples, palaces, forts, roads, irrigation projects and other infrastructure activities as they excelled both in sculpture and infrastructure building. In view of these movements the community scattered throughout India and out side India and lost identity as merged in the local culture and language.
Having regard to the above historical debate between the two it was planned to collect the information of activities of Od people and leadership of community all India with the help of Wikipedia, Facebook and BlogSpot articles and contacts. Sri. Chandrasekhar went on research about community activities all India and also documented the Od history all India and got the contacts of Sri Shankar Lal Od , an Engineer in service of Delhi Government who was in the activities of Od Jagrithi Sangh from New Delhi in vain. Sri. Lal Chand also an Engineer junior to him associated with him in efforts of organisation of Od community in north India. These two developed interaction with Chandrasekhar and established personal relationship. Sri. Chandrashekhar attended marriages and small family programmes in Delhi Od and came to know similarities and common culture between the north and south.
In the mean time Shivarudraiahswamy did research all India to find common Gotras and relationship between Od, Beldar Od, Od Rajput, Vadar, Oad, Vadde, Vadra, Boyar, Boyan and Bhovis and documented in Wikipedia and Facebook which gave way to understanding between all these community educated class to know that all these castes are one community scattered in various languages and areas due to migration but are the same people having common gotras, common culture and common language of Odra and Odki. All claimed their origin from Odra Desha, a country between todays Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar. Odras referred as Kshatriyas in Mahabharata who paid their tributes to Pandavas in Rajasooya Yaga. Its also believed during Kalinga war Asoka made them war prisoners and forced to work on , stone breaking and into rock cutting to road building activities along with other prisoners. This ultimately forced Odras to accept public works activities as their caste profession. As they moved in search of job naturally spread all India but never forgot their roots in Odra Desha and continued to call them selves Od, Ode, Odd, Vadda, Vadra, Vadar, Od Rajput, Odeya Rajar etc.
After confirmation of above historical events from all sides its accepted Od are all one community and decided to float a national forum by name Od Samaj under the Chairmanship of Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy in the year 2012 and leadership of Shimoga district of Karnataka supported his cause to the unity of Od all India and planned for a national level programmes to bring Od all India.
To begin a District level convention was convened in Shimoga under the guidance of Community Guruji Immadi Siddarameswara Swamiji to celebrate birthday of Community JagathGuru Sri Siddarameswarar 840 birthday. In the month of Feb 2013 on 17th a gathering of 10000 people convention was held under the Presidentship of Sri Shivarudraiahswamy. It was a never before gathering of Od people in Karnataka and remembered as a historical event paving way to similar conventions all over Karnataka. This event gave a direction and courage to community leaders to organise further in their district and which finally gave way to Historical Convention of All India Bhovi Samaj Convention in Bangalore on 2015.
Before the convention a meeting of all Karnataka leadership was called in Bagalkot to commemorate the Community Guruji Sharana Basava ji and under the leadership of Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi, the then Hon. Minister of Minor Irrigation Government of Karnataka it was planned to above convention to which nearly 3lakh community people graced from all corners of Karnataka. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, Sri. Lal Chand Dahag from Delhi, Sri Narayana Bhai Oad, Surat, Gujarat, Sri. Bharat Vitkar, Poona and Manohar Mudholkar, Sholapur from Maharashtra, Sri. Anjanraju Bandaru, Sri. Sammaiah , from Hyderabad Sri Swarna Kumar Khammam, Telangana and many members from neighbouring Tamilnadu and Andhra Pradesh attended as special invitees in the programme.
After the programme Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy one of the convenors of the programme called the meeting of leadership other states in his private office in Gandhinagar Bangalore in consultation with Hon. Guruji. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, Sri. Lal Chand Dahag from Delhi, Sri Narayana Bhai Oad, Surat, Gujarat, Sri. Bharat Vitkar, Poona and Manohar Mudholkar, Sholapur from Maharashtra, Sri. Anjanraju Bandaru, and Sri. T. Chandrasekhar were present in the meeting and gave their opinions on floating a national level organisation of Od Community.
The said meeting was a successful in the sense all the participating leaders agreed to work together under the guidance of Guruji and Shivarudraiahswamy nominated as First National Convenor and was requested to coordinate further in the matter. Finally organisation was agreed the name suggested by Shivarudraiahswamy - " Od Community Council of India". The said title was already registered IP by Shivarudraiahswamy in the year 2012 with its headquarters at Bangalore which was offered in principle to the organisation. However, the leaders felt it a practically difficult by them to take up the responsibility and lacked directions. However being a National Convenor Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy persisted the objective and successfully convened a national meeting of all the leaders in Delhi where members from Uttar Pradesh Sri. Sathyapraksh Od Ghaziabad, Sri. Rajesh Verma Advocate, Sri. Munshiram Od , Sri. Kamal Kishor Od, Sri. Dileep Kumar from Delhi, Sri. Vemula Venkatesh and his Associates, Sri. Sammaiah and Sri Swarna Kumar from Hyderabad and Andhra Pradesh took active participation. Sri Shivarudraiahswamy declined the offer of National President post stating only a person from New Delhi or persons near Delhi should become National President to lead organisation as proposed National headquarters would be New Delhi or Ghaziabad. As a result Sri. Shankar Lal was requested to be the Chairman and the post of National President was left undeclared till next meeting of national leaders. After due discussions and in consultation with Guruji and leaders concern both present and absent the following office bearers proposed and nominated unanimously:
1. Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy National General Secretary (Organisation)
2.Sri. Sammaiah, National Working President, South
3.Sri. Bharat Vitkar National Vice President, Maharashtra
4. Sri. Vemula Venkatesh, National Vice President, Andhra Pradesh -1
5. Sri. Uppu Meera, National Vice President Andhra Pradesh -2 (in absentia)
6. Sri. Rajesh Kumar Verma,National Vice President , Delhi NCR
7. Sri. Satya Prakash Od ,National Vice President, Uttar Pradesh
8. Sri. Narayana Bhai Oad, National Vice President, Gujarat
9. Sri. Anjanaraju Bandaru, National Advisory ( in absentia)
10. Sri. Lalchand, National Secretary ( Headquarters )
11. Sri. Swarna Kumar National Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh)
12. Sri. Laxmaiah National Secretary 2 ( Andhra Pradesh)
13. Sri. Kamal Kishor Od, National Secretary ( Delhi NCR)
14. Sri.Lakshmikantaiah, State Joint Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh)
15. Sri. Attiri Marayya State Vice President (Andhra Pradesh)
16. Sri. Yesudas Guntur, State Joint Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh) in absentia
17. Sri. Manohar Mudholkar, National Joint Secretary ( Maharashtra),
18. Sri. Munshiram Gadhai Treasurer.
19. Sri. UMK Rajagopalan Tandavalar Tamil Nadu
20. Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi Minister of Karnataka Government and
21. Sri. T. Chandrasekhar Karnataka consented to be the Advisory on National Advisory Board. There were other willing leaders from Rajasthan, Madhyapradesh, Uttarakhand, Uttarpradesh, Punjab and Tamilnadu who requested sone more time to consent and they all participated in Bhagirath Jayanthi slated in the month of July. Unfortunately no proper meeting of all these leaders took place as all of them scattered to tour around Delhi. As no meeting took place during this time another meeting was convened where Guruji Consented to be the Hon. Advisory and Sri. Arvind Limbavali Ex-Minister and MLA consented to be Hon. President and Sri. Shankar Lal officially declared to be the National President, Sri. Ravi Makali as National Working President, Sri. Shivarudraiah swamy as National President ( South India). Sri. Lalchand , Sri.Bharat Vitkar and Sri. Sammaiah declared to be National General Secretaries along with other office bearers with minor modifications to the original team. At present following is the office bearers of OCCI is officially elected and working since 2016:
National Advisory Board
1. Hon. Guruji as Chief Advisory
2. Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi Ex-Minister and MLA. Hon. Advisory
3. Sri. T.S.Chandrasekhar, Advisory
National Executive Board
1. Sri. Arvind Limbavali Ex-Minister and MLA. - Hon. National President
2. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, National President New Delhi
3. Sri. Ravi Makali, National Working President , Bangalore
4. Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy ,National President (South) Bangalore
5. Sri. Suresh Od, National President (North) New Delhi
6.National Vice Presidents
1. Sri. Swarna Kumar - Telangana
2. Sri. Pallapu Ramaiah - Andhra Pradesh
3. Sri. Aruchamy - Tamil Nadu
4. Sri. Vasanth Gunjal - Maharashtra
5. Sri. Narayan Bhai Oad- Gujarat
6. Sri. Parasmal Od - Rajasthan
7. Sri. Sathyapraksh Od - Uttar Pradesh
8. Sri
It was in the year 2011 Karnataka Od community officers Sri Shivarudraiahswamy then Income tax officer of Bengaluru and Sri T Chandrasekhar Deputy Director of Korea Trade Centre in Bangalore conceptualised to foundation of All India level organisation of Od Bhovi community basing in New Delhi with an objective to bring the all India scattered Od community in different names , different language segments to one national forum in one common name as Od.
It's historical fact that the community had moved all India and was also ex parted beyond Indian territories to build temples, palaces, forts, roads, irrigation projects and other infrastructure activities as they excelled both in sculpture and infrastructure building. In view of these movements the community scattered throughout India and out side India and lost identity as merged in the local culture and language.
Having regard to the above historical debate between the two it was planned to collect the information of activities of Od people and leadership of community all India with the help of Wikipedia, Facebook and BlogSpot articles and contacts. Sri. Chandrasekhar went on research about community activities all India and also documented the Od history all India and got the contacts of Sri Shankar Lal Od , an Engineer in service of Delhi Government who was in the activities of Od Jagrithi Sangh from New Delhi in vain. Sri. Lal Chand also an Engineer junior to him associated with him in efforts of organisation of Od community in north India. These two developed interaction with Chandrasekhar and established personal relationship. Sri. Chandrashekhar attended marriages and small family programmes in Delhi Od and came to know similarities and common culture between the north and south.
In the mean time Shivarudraiahswamy did research all India to find common Gotras and relationship between Od, Beldar Od, Od Rajput, Vadar, Oad, Vadde, Vadra, Boyar, Boyan and Bhovis and documented in Wikipedia and Facebook which gave way to understanding between all these community educated class to know that all these castes are one community scattered in various languages and areas due to migration but are the same people having common gotras, common culture and common language of Odra and Odki. All claimed their origin from Odra Desha, a country between todays Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar. Odras referred as Kshatriyas in Mahabharata who paid their tributes to Pandavas in Rajasooya Yaga. Its also believed during Kalinga war Asoka made them war prisoners and forced to work on , stone breaking and into rock cutting to road building activities along with other prisoners. This ultimately forced Odras to accept public works activities as their caste profession. As they moved in search of job naturally spread all India but never forgot their roots in Odra Desha and continued to call them selves Od, Ode, Odd, Vadda, Vadra, Vadar, Od Rajput, Odeya Rajar etc.
After confirmation of above historical events from all sides its accepted Od are all one community and decided to float a national forum by name Od Samaj under the Chairmanship of Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy in the year 2012 and leadership of Shimoga district of Karnataka supported his cause to the unity of Od all India and planned for a national level programmes to bring Od all India.
To begin a District level convention was convened in Shimoga under the guidance of Community Guruji Immadi Siddarameswara Swamiji to celebrate birthday of Community JagathGuru Sri Siddarameswarar 840 birthday. In the month of Feb 2013 on 17th a gathering of 10000 people convention was held under the Presidentship of Sri Shivarudraiahswamy. It was a never before gathering of Od people in Karnataka and remembered as a historical event paving way to similar conventions all over Karnataka. This event gave a direction and courage to community leaders to organise further in their district and which finally gave way to Historical Convention of All India Bhovi Samaj Convention in Bangalore on 2015.
Before the convention a meeting of all Karnataka leadership was called in Bagalkot to commemorate the Community Guruji Sharana Basava ji and under the leadership of Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi, the then Hon. Minister of Minor Irrigation Government of Karnataka it was planned to above convention to which nearly 3lakh community people graced from all corners of Karnataka. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, Sri. Lal Chand Dahag from Delhi, Sri Narayana Bhai Oad, Surat, Gujarat, Sri. Bharat Vitkar, Poona and Manohar Mudholkar, Sholapur from Maharashtra, Sri. Anjanraju Bandaru, Sri. Sammaiah , from Hyderabad Sri Swarna Kumar Khammam, Telangana and many members from neighbouring Tamilnadu and Andhra Pradesh attended as special invitees in the programme.
After the programme Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy one of the convenors of the programme called the meeting of leadership other states in his private office in Gandhinagar Bangalore in consultation with Hon. Guruji. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, Sri. Lal Chand Dahag from Delhi, Sri Narayana Bhai Oad, Surat, Gujarat, Sri. Bharat Vitkar, Poona and Manohar Mudholkar, Sholapur from Maharashtra, Sri. Anjanraju Bandaru, and Sri. T. Chandrasekhar were present in the meeting and gave their opinions on floating a national level organisation of Od Community.
The said meeting was a successful in the sense all the participating leaders agreed to work together under the guidance of Guruji and Shivarudraiahswamy nominated as First National Convenor and was requested to coordinate further in the matter. Finally organisation was agreed the name suggested by Shivarudraiahswamy - " Od Community Council of India". The said title was already registered IP by Shivarudraiahswamy in the year 2012 with its headquarters at Bangalore which was offered in principle to the organisation. However, the leaders felt it a practically difficult by them to take up the responsibility and lacked directions. However being a National Convenor Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy persisted the objective and successfully convened a national meeting of all the leaders in Delhi where members from Uttar Pradesh Sri. Sathyapraksh Od Ghaziabad, Sri. Rajesh Verma Advocate, Sri. Munshiram Od , Sri. Kamal Kishor Od, Sri. Dileep Kumar from Delhi, Sri. Vemula Venkatesh and his Associates, Sri. Sammaiah and Sri Swarna Kumar from Hyderabad and Andhra Pradesh took active participation. Sri Shivarudraiahswamy declined the offer of National President post stating only a person from New Delhi or persons near Delhi should become National President to lead organisation as proposed National headquarters would be New Delhi or Ghaziabad. As a result Sri. Shankar Lal was requested to be the Chairman and the post of National President was left undeclared till next meeting of national leaders. After due discussions and in consultation with Guruji and leaders concern both present and absent the following office bearers proposed and nominated unanimously:
1. Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy National General Secretary (Organisation)
2.Sri. Sammaiah, National Working President, South
3.Sri. Bharat Vitkar National Vice President, Maharashtra
4. Sri. Vemula Venkatesh, National Vice President, Andhra Pradesh -1
5. Sri. Uppu Meera, National Vice President Andhra Pradesh -2 (in absentia)
6. Sri. Rajesh Kumar Verma,National Vice President , Delhi NCR
7. Sri. Satya Prakash Od ,National Vice President, Uttar Pradesh
8. Sri. Narayana Bhai Oad, National Vice President, Gujarat
9. Sri. Anjanaraju Bandaru, National Advisory ( in absentia)
10. Sri. Lalchand, National Secretary ( Headquarters )
11. Sri. Swarna Kumar National Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh)
12. Sri. Laxmaiah National Secretary 2 ( Andhra Pradesh)
13. Sri. Kamal Kishor Od, National Secretary ( Delhi NCR)
14. Sri.Lakshmikantaiah, State Joint Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh)
15. Sri. Attiri Marayya State Vice President (Andhra Pradesh)
16. Sri. Yesudas Guntur, State Joint Secretary ( Andhra Pradesh) in absentia
17. Sri. Manohar Mudholkar, National Joint Secretary ( Maharashtra),
18. Sri. Munshiram Gadhai Treasurer.
19. Sri. UMK Rajagopalan Tandavalar Tamil Nadu
20. Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi Minister of Karnataka Government and
21. Sri. T. Chandrasekhar Karnataka consented to be the Advisory on National Advisory Board. There were other willing leaders from Rajasthan, Madhyapradesh, Uttarakhand, Uttarpradesh, Punjab and Tamilnadu who requested sone more time to consent and they all participated in Bhagirath Jayanthi slated in the month of July. Unfortunately no proper meeting of all these leaders took place as all of them scattered to tour around Delhi. As no meeting took place during this time another meeting was convened where Guruji Consented to be the Hon. Advisory and Sri. Arvind Limbavali Ex-Minister and MLA consented to be Hon. President and Sri. Shankar Lal officially declared to be the National President, Sri. Ravi Makali as National Working President, Sri. Shivarudraiah swamy as National President ( South India). Sri. Lalchand , Sri.Bharat Vitkar and Sri. Sammaiah declared to be National General Secretaries along with other office bearers with minor modifications to the original team. At present following is the office bearers of OCCI is officially elected and working since 2016:
National Advisory Board
1. Hon. Guruji as Chief Advisory
2. Sri. Shivaraj Tangadagi Ex-Minister and MLA. Hon. Advisory
3. Sri. T.S.Chandrasekhar, Advisory
National Executive Board
1. Sri. Arvind Limbavali Ex-Minister and MLA. - Hon. National President
2. Sri. Shankar Lal Od, National President New Delhi
3. Sri. Ravi Makali, National Working President , Bangalore
4. Sri. Shivarudraiahswamy ,National President (South) Bangalore
5. Sri. Suresh Od, National President (North) New Delhi
6.National Vice Presidents
1. Sri. Swarna Kumar - Telangana
2. Sri. Pallapu Ramaiah - Andhra Pradesh
3. Sri. Aruchamy - Tamil Nadu
4. Sri. Vasanth Gunjal - Maharashtra
5. Sri. Narayan Bhai Oad- Gujarat
6. Sri. Parasmal Od - Rajasthan
7. Sri. Sathyapraksh Od - Uttar Pradesh
8. Sri
