(This article appeared in Azcentral on June 27, 2021)
Raveen Arora was about 7 years old when Mother Teresa visited his school in Kolkata. The Catholic nun who devoted her life to giving lined up Arora and his classmates and asked the boys to donate a rupee. Arora, whose working-class family had resettled in the area years earlier as refugees, slid his hand into his pocket. But knowing he had nothing to give, his hand lingered there. When Mother Teresa asked why he put his hand in his pocket, a young Arora said it wasn’t to copy his classmates but because he wanted to help. The soft-spoken Tempe businessman is full of anecdotes from his childhood. He doesn’t retell the stories to get a reaction, though they certainly elicit one. These are moments that sparked a lifelong interest in public service and a desire to improve his community by helping people regardless of their race or status, which this year earned Arora a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize…
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