Frequently asked questions (FAQ)?
The Tamil department in Cologne University has a rich history dating back to the 1960s. With more than half a century of Tamil research & teaching heritage and one of the largest Tamil libraries (with about 40000 books) in western-world, the University will be an appropriate place to continue its contributions to Tamil language.
Due to financial crisis at Cologne University, it has been decided to dissolve the Department of Indology & Tamil Studies with the retirement of its current Prof. Dr. Ulrike Niklas.
By funding a lectureship position, the department can be further sustained until the end of May 2022. Otherwise, the last lecturer contract will be terminated by March 2021.
Our efforts are currently towards securing the lecturer position upto March 2022. However to sustain the tamil studies at Cologne University for long-term
- We have approached the Chief Minister & Minister for Tamil Official Language & Tamil Culture of Govt of Tamil Nadu to intervene with the University for sustaining the department activities.
- The Consulate General of India, Frankfurt was also apprised about this situation to seek support from Government of India through ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Culture & Ministry of Human Resources & Development. We have also written to the Prime Minister’s Office. The department would greatly benefit and will be strengthened, if it receives support with regular funding and also via exchange programs that have already been established by the Government of India, such as ICCR Chairs, Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT).
- Letters of request were also written to the Mayor of Cologne, Minister President of North-Rhein Westphalia explaining the need to continue the Tamil Studies at Cologne University.
- We have also written to the Dean, Faculty of Arts & Humanities requesting for the continuation of the department for long-term.
We have reached out to these above mentioned authorities and we sincerely hope & believe that these efforts will succeed.
Europe Tamilargal, a federation of Tamil organisations across Europe has taken up this initiative.
- Contribute to the crowd-funding
- By volunteering to work for this cause
- You can support this initiative by spreading awareness about this campaign amongst the Tamil populace across the globe.
- Organise local fund-raising events in your community
The funds will be used towards sustaining the lectureship of Mr. Sven Wortmann with following objectives.
- Continued teaching and research activities for development of modern teaching methodology for the tamil language
- Conducting annual Summer Schools (language and culture) in Pondicherry (India)
- Maintenance of the more than 40,000 books strong library.
The funds are collected via crowd-funding platform betterplace.org. betterplace is a charitable and non-profit organisation.
- betterplace.org is Germany’s largest donation platform.
- betterplace.org is operated by gut.org a non-profit organization hence their commissions are reasonable. Compared to other such platforms they charge only 2.5% transaction fees for each donation.
- Only organizations recognized as non-profit organizations in Germany can collect donations on betterplace.org. München Tamil Sangam e.V. registered in München, registration number VR 207826 is representing Europe Tamilargal for collecting the funds.
Being a non-profit organisation themselves betterplace.org relies on individual donations and private fundings to run the platform. The donation page is supplemented with an option to donate optionally to betterplace.org.
betterplace.org issues donation receipts automatically in the beginning of the following calendar year. For further information please click here.
For people donating from India-
- Since your credit card will be charged in Euros, please clarify with the issuer of your credit card, if international transactions have been enabled. Most credit card issuing organizations in India do not allow international transactions by default to protect the credit card users like yourself from phishing attacks.
- Credit card issuing banks have automated software that detect out of the ordinary spending and automatically block the transaction for the credit card holders safety.
Both problems can be solved by a short phone call to the credit card issuing bank.
Also here is a link with a list of Indian credit cards that offers international transactions.
Please follow the donate now button to contribute to our crowd-funding effort in the menu or click here
Yes. All funds received via the crowd-funding platform will go towards sustaining the Tamil Studies at Cologne University.
The target deadline to collect €137500 is set to 31st March 2021. These funds will ensure the lectureship position until 31st May 2022.