Comments on: One Desi and Philanthropy

By: Jaspal

Jaspal — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 09:33:46 +0000

Wow! The internet is truly the great equalizer. It is easy to make ridiculous comments when you can hide behind a screen name. I won’t do that. I’ll be clear from the beginning, I am in fact one of his half white sons. And I can speak to many of your comments with more knowledge than hearsay or newspaper articles. First off I will not speak on my father’s fashion sense, it has been a point of contention between us in the past. I will only say that this picture’s resolution terrible, and the suit is actually black with light purple pinstripes. I will also comment that I am almost certain that my mother did not pick that outfit for him.
As far as the drug paraphernalia is concerned, of all of our gas stations, we do not run any of them. We lease them out to individual operators. We have found that a store is most successful when the operator has pride in the location. The lessee owns all of the inside merchandise while we maintain the gas. Our company as well as the brands that we sell under have certain requirements including cleanliness, uniforms, and not selling merchandise considered questionable. This may sound like a company line but I will back it up with this. I personally sit on community watch groups to rectify this situation. We have been able to bring in all of the operators that work with us as well as many independents. The core issues that we are working on is to make the items (blunts, rolling papers, roses) illegal. Our company sees no money from the sale of these items or any other items in the store. The problem the operator faces is that if they stop selling these items and the store down the street does not, they are losing there livelihood. The greater problem is the demand for these items for illicit activities, and from what I’ve seen and heard, if someone wants to do drugs they will find whatever means necessary to do them. As a side note, the employees at the gas stations (the ones we are supposedly bringing to the US and exploiting) are not our employees, rather under the employment of the station operator. It makes me terribly sad to read the animosity regarding the charitable giving by my father. One thing I have realized in my life, regardless of how hard you try, you will never please everybody. Neither my father nor myself was born with a silver spoon in our mouths. My father has worked for what he has achieved, and contrary to comments posted above, it has not been by exploiting others, especially not his own countrymen. He has always wanted to give back to the communities that have helped him get where he is. Whether the negativity is due to him not giving to someone’s particular charity or institution, or if people are just skeptical for his reasons, I don’t know. I do not always agree with his choices, but I do not condemn him for doing the things in which he believes. Especially when it is helping others. Finally, and most personally, to comment on the folks who want to have a laugh at the fact that my father married at white women (my mother), I really do hope you are actually more intelligent than you came across in your posts. My mother and father went to school together and fell in love, nothing terrible in that. They got married and had six kids. My mother, who is one hundred percent Dutch, can probably speak better Punjabi than most Punjabi kids born and raised in the US. My parents raised all of us kids with both of there faiths, telling us that neither was wrong. We were told there is one God and only different ways of worshipping him. I am a Sikh, with a turban and a beard. It is no political statement as some of you may believe. It is who I am and an important part of my identity. As a child I was confused by why I looked different than everybody else, the white kids with cut hair and the desis with brown skin. My dad helped me realize that I wasn’t going to be like anyone else, that I came from two distinct cultures that were both a part of me. And most importantly, that I should embrace. I will not sit here and say the Darshan Dhaliwal is flawless, nor will I say he hasn’t made mistakes. And as I already said, we definitely don’t see eye to eye all the time. I will, however, not hide behind an assumed name and make comments with little to no basis. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you all entitled to yours. Mine is a little biased, but I have had more direct experience.

By: Jiggmeister

Jiggmeister — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 23:15:12 +0000

Word on the street is Mr. Dhaliwhal has a reputation of promising to donate to Sikh charities, and ends up never doing so. I would look into this guy a bit deeper.

By: classical liberal warrior against terror

classical liberal warrior against terror — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 20:55:07 +0000

Big deal that his store is selling roses in a can. and thanks for letting me know what they are. My neighborhood gas station is owned by a Portuguese and he carries them too.

If the kids wanna do drugs let em buy it. What do any one of us care.

It was interesting folks brought on carnegie rockefeller etc. Carnegie\'s only fault may have been the market place being dumb otherwise folks would have seen through the pamphlets on competitors steel that was distributed.

Carnegie did good with his wealth, I dont know much about this gentleman. and I dont see anything wrong with his stores selling those roses.

Entrepreneurs types do more good than the lawyer/middlemen/professor types. Who probably are the real robber barons who get away with the works of others.

Also any desi interested in trying the blunt cigar with alternate fillers.... Next meetup should involve this.

By: MD

MD — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 00:38:54 +0000

Camille, sorry, I just realized that I totally read things into your comment that I shouldn’t have. Oddly enough, I got mad on another thread when I thought someone did the same to me. So, sorry.

By: Camille

Camille — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 06:35:37 +0000

MD, I was critiquing the statement that Dhaliwal's business was built on holding people down at the same "level of badness" as people like Yale, Rhodes, Rockefeller, etc. I can't comment on your point about activism because you've left it so broad and open to interpretation that I have no idea what context you have in mind when making your statement.

If you'd like we can absolutely discuss offline. There's no need to take up more space.

By: MD

MD — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:21:14 +0000

Camille, well what the heck did you mean by that confusing comment in #40? You have no problem conjecturing that Dhaliwal's philanthropy was built, at least, in part, on 'holding other people down'. So, if you are going to say that we should pay attention to the negative effects of building up a business, I say we should pay attention to the negative effects of certain types of activism. What do you think of that larger point?

By: Clueless

Clueless — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 06:13:29 +0000

Yeah Damn straight I’m right. When it comes to pictures of Bush and sikh’s I’m the info guy.

By: Ennis

Ennis — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 03:10:56 +0000

Clueless is right – it’s a post 9/11 meeting photo. It was taken September 26, 2001.

By: Manju

Manju — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 01:29:23 +0000

What is it with some desi business people and the republican party

I think they just want to sleep with white women. Dhaliwal apparently succeded.

Sitting next to Bush - dhaliwal looks like the maharaja of one of the punjabi principalitiy, who colluded with the british

Hitler had facial hair too.

Bush probably patted the turbanned uncle tom on his head for donating money to the bush/cheney machine.....disguting!

Its worse then that. The Bushs like to pat the underlings on the ass.

From what I have heard, he underpays his employees

I heard he shot his dog.

A large number of them are undocumented, thus afraid of being deported and easily exploited.

This is why he supports bush. They just want cheap labour that can be exploited. Clearly the humane thing to do is keep these people out of this oppresive country. What self-hatred leads some peole to do never seizes to amaze me.

By: Clueless

Clueless — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 00:53:28 +0000

I don’t know if he a democract or republican but both he and his wife did give money to Bush. However that does make him an uncle tom. The picture of him with Bush is from Sept 26, 2001. This was just 2 weeks after 9/11 when Bush met with sikh leaders after 9/11 due to the concerns about backlash against sikhs.