Today we are going to talk to an employee of public works department who keeps aside 50% of her salary for supporting a cause close to her heart. For the past ten years Jayanthi has been providing financial support to those who want to study but don’t have the means for it. She started by supporting 2 students. She eventually started an NGO that provides fees to interested children and is today supporting 120 students from 5th standard to engineering graduates. She does all this while continuing to work at PWD. Isn’t she amazing?

Interviewer: Welcome Ms. Jayanthi. You have been providing educational support to many. Can you elaborate on it?

Jayanthi: We started the organization ‘Udavum Manangal’ on 2002. When we started this organization there was this student who wanted to join SIT (Seshayee Institute of Technology). He had very good marks 464 out of 500 and had got centum in Mathematics. He was working as a night watchman in a department in PWD. At that time we helped him get enrolled in the institute. We took care of his fees for 3 years. A boy who was struggling to make his ends meet and working for Rs.1000/- when he finished the course with 94% was recruited by Larsen & Toubro (Hosur). This really motivated us.

Interviewer: What was the factor which made you to reach out to this person and start the organization in the first place?

Jayanthi: My father – 10 days before his death- asked me as to what my plans where for the future. To which I replied that I don’t have any specific goal. Hearing this, my father advised me to invest 50% of my earnings to support educational cause of children who were not related to me. At that time I felt it was enormous. But my father asked me ‘Isn’t half your earnings more than enough for an individual’s need?’ I agreed with him and since then been setting aside 50% of my salary to provide financial support to educate the needy children at government school who wanted to study. We consider each student individually and depending on his/her marks we decide on the course of action to be taken. If the child is extremely good at studies then we might even put the person through an engineering course else we enroll them in a polytechnic course. For those who score marks below average we at least aim to make him a skilled labour and join him in appropriate vocational course. But for engineering we look to support only those who get a seat through merit as we really cannot afford self-financing college. Per year around Rs.10, 000 we provide for engineering. For polytechnic we provide Rs.5, 000 and at the school level we provide around Rs.2,000 – 2,500 depending on the needs. We ensure that there are no drop outs.

Interviewer: Excellent. Drop out is a very challenging issue. How do you ensure that no one drops out?

When we screen the students, we consider their background and estimate to what level we will be able to educate the person. We then speak to parents, village officer or panchayat, headmaster. If anyone informs us of a student (whom we are supporting) drops out we meet various persons from the headmaster to panchayat leader and convince them to let the child continue with education

Interviewer: Till date, how many students would you have helped?

Jayanthi: We started with 2 students. Now we are supporting120 students. What I am really proud of is that there are 14 engineering students who got through to the government colleges on merit. All of them have a very high cut off of about 198. Getting such good marks by a student from rural areas is very difficult. This is a great achievement of the students. Example of this a girl named Janaki. She will soon be passing out as an engineer from the college. When she joined the course, she was suffering from stammering. The college principle took Janaki under her wings and provided her treatment for the same and will soon be making her a lecturer at the same. The credit goes to both her and the principle

Interviewer: Very nice. How do you select the students for whom you would be providing support?

Jayanthi: We initially accept the students referred by teachers and headmaster of the government school. In six months time, we will be able to properly gauge their status. Other than that students referred by my friends, colleagues will be accepted immediately for the first year of support. In six months time, we collect the data (we have 10 volunteers as our committee members) and prepare a report. I too personally visit and check out the candidate. If we are ok with it then support to the person automatically continues. Let us say he/she joins us in the 6th standard till the student completes education and secures a job we keep the support going

Interviewer: All this, would require a lot of effort and money. How much would you be spending annually for this initiative?

Just for education, we spend around Rs. 5,00,0000. I will be able to take care of the expenses up to 2.5 lakhs. The rest is provided by my friends and colleagues. They make up 100 permanent members and contribute the rest of the amount. I have never had trouble with sourcing fund. For these 120 students, funding is not at all a problem

Interviewer: Have you ever declined helping a candidate who has approached you for help?

By God’s grace we have not rejected a single candidate till date. Sometimes what we do is that the support is not provided by our organization. It is taken up by any of our volunteer who then sponsors the candidates’ fee. The entire course fee is taken care of by the individual. We just link the candidate with the sponsor.

Interviewer: How many students have completed education and have got into a job?

22 students have joined work force. They are all diploma students. Soon Janaki (the engineering student I was talking about earlier) will be joining their ranks too. From now on, there will be 4 engineering graduates who will be getting into a job every year.

Interviewer: What do you get out of doing all this?

Contentment. I feel happy doing this. Making a person independent and capable of taking care of himself and his family is very satisfying. Such a person will somehow manage in life and will definitely help a few more individuals.

Interviewer: Many persons want to help but don’t know what to do. Do you have any suggestions for them?

Not just what to do. But also is it right to help this NGO. It is not just money that is required. There is this person in GH (at Trichi) who distributes hot water to patients and attendant at 6:30 AM. At first I thought why someone is providing hot water. We tend to think that one should give money or certain types of in-kind donation to be of service to others. That is not true. Persons in GH (General Hospital) need hot water in the morning. So when someone brings that to them it is useful. Noticing it, (within a month’s time) someone else started distributing porridge outside GH for persons in GH

Interviewer: If someone wants to support you/ contact you how can they go about it?

I could be contacted on my email [email protected].

Thanks a lot-------------------------------------------------------------------------We would like to thank Mr. J. Prabhakaran for putting us in touch with Ms. Jayanthi