Life & Work with Ram Agrawal

As the first person in my family to immigrate, I love living in the U.S. and wanted to share the best parts of my upbringing in India with my new family here in America. There were multiple celebrations of Diwali, some in the housing communities, some in the regional groups, and some done by orgs for profit. I fleshed out a rough blueprint of the event based on what I wanted to accomplish. I wanted the growing population of Indians and people interested in celebrating Diwali in Round Rock and surrounding areas to be able to gather in a unified place. I wanted everyone to be able to savor the delicious food of India, dance, celebrate, enjoy, and most importantly I wanted the event to be accessible to anyone, for free. The second motive of the festival is to provide a platform to the budding talents of Austin. I know, many parents impart the legacy of Indian classical and various other dance farms with their kids. I wanted to bring these varieties of performances on one big stage and again the performers should not pay for showing their talent. The third motive was to promote small businesses. At the end of the day, I wanted to bring the community together.

Hosting a large-scale event for free was going to be a challenge, so I needed support to execute the event and of course the fund for space, insurance, DJ and table, chairs, lights and so on. After deciding on an outline of the event with various activities, vendors, performers, and small businesses, I approached nearby cities including the city of Round Rock to pitch my idea and was put in touch with Scot Wilkinson in the Round Rock Arts department. Mr. Wilkinson was immediately enthusiastic, and we started discussing venue options. For financing, I started looking for sponsors and vendors, and determined that Taj Fashion, my wife’s Indian clothing business, would sponsor the remaining cost, to begin with.

I quickly realized how many additional considerations would need to be made. Diwali is the festival of lights, and I wanted to make sure that our event would shine brightly for everyone to enjoy. To pull this off, my amazing friends and neighbors banded together. This core team has stayed the same even as RR Diwali Fest grows every year because, at its heart, this is a family event. All of the decorations, setup, and schedule coordination are completed by volunteers, and we always need more help!

The first year RR Diwali Fest was held, there were a limited number of performances and a few vendors, culminating in a simple but fun event. Since then, we’ve incorporated a rangoli competition, accepted drawing and art submissions for display at the event, nearly tripled the number of performances and vendors, added photo booths, and drew almost 12,000 people this year. Overall, the reason the Festival has been able to expand as much as it has is due to the people that make this event possible. Scot, the Arts department of Round Rock, our core team, and volunteers have been more supportive than I can express, and we definitely could not pull this off without them – they have provided guidance and resources to help us give back to our community. So, at the end of the day, we were able to get where we are today simply because of the people we have had the invaluable opportunity to work with! I could not ask for a more tight-knit and hardworking team.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The first challenge I encountered was determining whether this event was viable. Almost every neighborhood in Austin has its own Diwali festival, so I wasn’t sure if people would want to attend this one as well. I still wanted to bring all the communities under one roof hence we though of taking chance and moved ahead. The second challenge was getting volunteers. My family and I resolved to do as much as we could on our own. Thankfully, our friends and neighbors were enthusiastic to help. Now comes the operation part, in the beginning years, financing was a big challenge. Sponsors were far and few because this was a new event with no recognition. We decided to personally finance the first event through my wife’s Indian fashion business, Taj Fashion.

It takes around 4 months of heavy involvement to plan and execute the festival every year. I work 4 to 6 hours each day and some days even more between July to October.

Now that the event has grown, we’re facing new and exciting challenges. There are a lot of other events and celebrations happening around the time of Diwali, so we try to choose a weekend that does not overlap.

We can accommodate around 50 performances in the event. This year we had more than 120 entries a month before hence we had to deny the new entrants. Also, we had to eliminate 70+ entries which was a difficult task. I want to give the opportunity to as many talents in the festival but we are hitting a time constraint. Also, the crowd is outgrowing our venue every year which is a good problem to have. We had around 12,000 people attended the event. I can foresee the challenge of accommodating more people in the current setup so we have to figure out some other ways.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Round Rock Diwali Festival is a free event for all ages to celebrate the festival of lights! I am the organizer of this event, so I oversee all the technical details and delegate responsibilities to ensure that everything runs as smoothly as possible. I am most proud of the growth and increased turnout to our event over the years, because it shows how enthusiastic the Round Rock community is to celebrate Diwali! Although now there are many similar events in Austin, we were the first Diwali festival to debut a wonderfully choreographed fashion show, which inspired local high schoolers to organize an additional, inspiring fashion show featuring children with special abilities. Watching the talented young kids dazzle the crowd was a touching experience, and that’s what I felt encapsulated the spirit of the Round Rock Diwali Festival.

The Round Rock Diwali Festival is not just an event anymore. It is a beacon of art activities in the area. It is on the cultural map of the city. For last 4 years, we have included Food Donations booth in the festival and have donated hundreds of pounds of food and thousands of dollars to the Round Rock Area Serving Center. From 2022, we also started recognizing people or organizations who have made a significant impact on the society.

I am proud that the festival who started small as a fun project has now become an institution in itself.

I am passionate about helping the community, My philosophy had been to help others especially people who are not privileged with various other community services. Out of those, I am most proud of the work we did during the pandemic to get the elderly vaccinated. Between March to May of 2021, we were able to get 60,000 elderly vaccinated. This was a perfect project where I created a website, integrated with hospital system, had 30+ volunteers to answer the calls, do the data analytics, schedule the vaccination and also volunteers who actually vaccinated the people on the ground. This was featured in local media and can be seen here: https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/austin-neighbors-create-website-to-help-hundreds-get-vaccinated-against-covid-19

What do you like and dislike about the city?
The Austin area is absolutely wonderful! I have been here for 15 years, and am awed by its growth. Even though Austin is turning into a huge city, it is, at its heart, a warm, loving place where people are always willing to lend a hand and have a friendly conversation. I love the beauty of the hill country right around the corner, the schools are great, the culture is incredible, and I can’t think of a better place to live with my family. Unfortunately, everyone has discovered this secret gem of a city, so now the cost of living is going up, but it is definitely worth it.

Other than organizing Round Rock Diwali Festival, I have wide variety of likes, hobbies, and interests. I like photography and have my pictures published in some media outlets. I write poems as well and organize Mehfil-E-Austin (Indian poetry recital) get-togethers as time permits. I like to travel and hike. Have explored most of the Austin area which offers so many beautiful hikes and trails and also traveled to various parts of the world.