Hindu priest Arun Gupta, Boise, will be the next featured speaker at the next Lifelong Learners session, which focuses on Hinduism, beginning at 1:30 p.m. Thursday at the Ontario Community Library. This is the last in the series on great world religions presented by the Lifelong Learners group, which is sponsored by the Ontario Community Library and the AAUW.

According to his biography, Gupta was born and grew up in north India where his father was a professor of physics at Jodhpur University. Gupta came to the United States, moving to Manhattan, Kan., on a Rotary Club undergraduate “goodwill ambassador” scholarship at the age of 18 in 1969. He went on to receive a bachelors and masters degrees in mechanical engineering from Kansas State University followed by an MBA in marketing from the University of Missouri at Kansas City.

Gupta worked in various capacities in the engineering and marketing areas for various companies through the years. He took an early retirement in 2005 to devote full time to the vocation that he loved most — managing a Hare Krishna temple he and his wife started in their family room in 1986 because, when they moved to Boise with their two sons, there was no place of Hindu worship. The temple grew gradually to the extent, in 1999, they built a new temple next to their home near Boise State University. In 1985, he and his wife, Aruddha, took vows of priesthood in the Hare Krishna tradition of Hinduism.

The Lifelong Learners group was first conceived in Malheur County in the fall of 2009 when a small group of women decided to encourage the development of an organization that would foster informal learning. The aim of the group is to provide quality lectures/discussions and presentations on worthwhile topics from a wide variety of subjects. The first program was centered around the five world religions. Future presentations will include topics from the arts, history, world cultures and science.