As sangams, associations, organisations and communities, each of us are playing a vital role in connecting the diaspora back to our roots in the homeland. To provide an united voice for all Tamils in Europe, we would like to kick start the Europe Tamilargal initiative, bringing together all the organisations representing the Tamil diaspora in Europe. We humbly request you to join and strengthen this initiative with your invaluable support. 

An immediate issue at hand, requires all of our combined efforts.

The Institute of Indology and Tamil studies at the Cologne University, Germany is one of the few institutes in Europe, focusing on Tamil research and teaching since 1963. Along with outstanding contributions to Tamil research, the University is actively teaching tamil and has produced some noteworthy scholars. With 40000+ tamil books, the university hosts one of the biggest tamil libraries outside Tamilnadu. Currently, the institute is also developing a methodology to teach Tamil as a foriegn language in Europe.       

Unfortunately, the University has decided to dissolve the department, owing to lack of funds and  the retirement of the current Professor, Dr. Ulrike Niklas. To ensure the continuity of the department activities with a lecturer position, Tamil Chair Inc. (Harvard, USA) supported with an initial funding. To sustain the Lectureship upto the planned term of 2022, an additional funding of € 137500 is required by March 2021. Otherwise all the research and teaching activities will be stopped with the immediate termination of Lectureship. 

As a united effort of Tamils across the globe, we are planning to kickstart a crowd-funding campaign to secure funding for the Lecturer position till 2022, thereby paving a way to continue our efforts in the long term, to save Tamil studies at Cologne University.

 We have attached detailed information regarding the status and an open letter from the Indology and Tamil Studies department. We will be providing an information session on the campaign on 20.02.2021, 7 PM CET.  We humbly request the participation of your organisation in session and provide your invaluable support for the initiative and campaign. 

Please find the link for the session below. 

Join Zoom Meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82569380093
Meeting ID: 825 6938 0093

Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kcrXgxn9t