CASA (Church's Auxiliary for Social Action) is a Non Government Organisation, which has been working for the upliftment of the society since 1947. CASA works to build a society where peace, justice, and equality prevails. Its primary focus is strive towards social development through empowerment of the weaker sections of society such as women, children, Dalits, tribals and others so that they can fight for their own legitimate rights and can lead a life with dignity.

CASA has celebrated its Diamond Jubilee – Sixty years of labor of love, work of faith and steadfastness of hope in 2007. Jubilee is a time of jubilation and gratitude. We remember with joy and gratitude the pioneering work of the founding mothers and fathers of CASA. This is an occasion to pay our humble homage to their dedicated and sacrificial work. Their commitment and conviction, their experience and expertise, made such an action-oriented Organization possible. Those stalwarts faced enormous difficulties and opposition in the 40s and 50s. Yet they boldly went ahead in the service of the nation. On this occasion, we salute them for their meritorious work among the poor and the marginalized.

Diamond jubilee is a moment of memory and hope – remembering what God has enabled through this ecumenical, pan-Indian Service Agency – moments of triumph and moments of tragedy, moments of ecstasy and moments of despair. It is also an opportunity to look forward with hope as God is the sustaining and strengthening power of this Organization. As we engage in retrospection, we should simultaneously engage in introspection – recalling the past, not for the sake for the past, but to shape and determine CASA’s destiny. We need to examine and evaluate critically and creatively its life and work for last sixty years. CASA is publicly acknowledged as the Official Social Action Arm of the twenty-four (24) Protestant and Orthodox churches. It is working in twenty-four States, covering more than 4000 villages. It is very well known from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, from Kohima to Kutch.

CASA inherently, by its nature, is the Church’s Auxiliary. There is a definitional crisis about this phrase. What does it mean, particularly the word ‘auxiliary’? What is the nature of this relationship? What is the role and responsibility of the Indian Church towards CASA and vice-a-versa? This requires a formulation or a reformulation.

CASA’s social action basically has to do with life – life in its fullness or wholeness. It deals with ALL of life and the WHOLE of life. It perceived life as a network of relationships. Therefore, its purpose and goal is to enhance and extend the World Wide Web (WWW) of relationship, which is not mechanical and only technological but human and organic. It is attempting, through its social action, to promote and strengthen the structures of relationship that will embrace everybody particularly the least, the last and the lost in socio-economic-political terms.

The year 2007 happens to be the diamond jubilee of India’s Independence. This year also happens to be the one hundred and fiftieth (150) year of the First War of Independence (1857). Such moments are rare in history. More significantly, the conjunction of such historic moments offers us an opportunity to critically reflect and learn the lessons from the legacy of the past. They should inspire and challenge us to move towards authentic freedom. For such a coincidence, it is important and necessary to locate CASA’s life and work within the totality of the Indian reality. Hence CASA  will be looking at the present socio-economic-political scenario in India and see whether CASA’s action is forging a new India as envisaged in the Indian Constitution, in its Preamble, it had boldly proclaimed,

“WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens: JUSTICE, social, economic and political; LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; EQUALITY of status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all, FRATERNITY assuring dignity of the individual and unity and integrity of the nation . . .”