Send 200 under- served kids to school in Banglore

Where Education makes Us Equal: A dream Is born

 This story is truly inspirational.   

    Lakshmi and Revathi B. are two sisters who passed out of Ashwini Charitable Trust (ACT) recently. Ten years ago, their father used to be a watchman. Their completely illiterate mother worked as a housemaid. Their older sister  married very young, and had 2 daughters,  one of whom was suffering from leukaemia. The father had several health complications due to excessive drinking and spent many moons in and out of hospital taking medical help for a damaged kidney, liver and excessive blood sugar issues. The family had run up huge loans for the father’s hospitalisations. That is when the mother appealed for our help. Her first daughter was uneducated but she was determined   to end the vicious cycle of illiteracy and poverty by seeing that her other daughters would complete schooling.        

  We took the girls under our wing. After 10 long years they completed their education.  Lakshmi passed out of St. Joseph’s College of Commerce with 65% aggregate in B.Com. and Revathi completed B.A. at St. Joseph’s Arts and Science with 66%. During their tenure at the Trust, they learnt dancing, drawing, acting, and computer skills. They used these skills to complete their college assignments and also learnt to email them to their lecturers via internet. They learnt to make Power Point Presentations and picked up the skills of making presentations in front of an audience. When they graduated in 2011, we helped them get jobs with AXA Business Service.

    In their first year at AXA BS, they carved a permanent niche for themselves in the hearts of their team members with their hard work, reliability and dedication. Lakshmi won the Best Joinee Award and Revathi won I Prize in the Cultural Activities of the company.

   The girls saved up their salaries and within a year cleared off all their father’s outstanding loans that had been raised for his many health problem. Currently, they are saving money to realise a family dream:   to buy a permanent roof over their heads.

Education has indeed made them Equal ………

Lakshmi and Revathi are only 2 of the305 children of Ashwini Charitable Trust. Each of these children is special and every child in the Trust is underprivileged … waiting for an opportunity to grow and make India proud.

This quarter  we received more than $2500 from all the generous supporters of our cause.We will use the money for the education of 23 children of the trust for the next academic year. We are truly owerwhemed by all your love and kindness.Thank you all very much and wish each and every one of you a very happy and prosperous new year 2014!

Come join our movement and create more such successes and be a part of the ACT family!

Veneetha joined ACT at the age of 9 when she had just entered Class V. She is the first of 2 girls, her father is a tailor and mother, a housewife. When she joined the Trust her father had to discontinue work due to ill health. He was drawing a monthly salary of Rs. 2,500 and  was unable to pay for his children’s education. Both parents sought our help and admitted Veneetha to the Trust.

Over the 11 years Veneetha has grown up into a fine young woman. She is hard working and has consistently scored good marks in her academic exams. She has picked up a lot of skills: Time Management, Leadership, and Presentation skills; use of software like MS Office Suite and Photoshop. She was one of the Lead Educators and grew proficient in the use of the Adobe suite. She sings and acts very well. She has learnt classical Kathak Dance and performs beautifully.

Veneetha passed out of St. Joseph’s College of Commerce with 62% in B.Com. She has obtained a job as Operations Officer in Standard Chartered Bank. Veneetha has dreamt of becoming a Bank Manager since High School. This is the first step in that direction.  Over the last 11 years many volunteers(our children address them as Akka, Anna ,Aunty or Uncle) have shared their skills and strengths that have propelled Veneetha to find her rightful  place in mainstream society.

 Read about her journey at ACT

I am Veneetha S.  I joined ACT in the year 2002,that is when I was doing class 5^th  Many volunteers helped me to grow successfully. When I was doing my class 7, Priya akka was teaching us math. Though Maths was my toughest subject, she taught me so well that I started loving that subject day by day. In class 10 my toughest subjects were Math and Science. It was Anil uncle and Arpita aunty who helped me to pass in those subjects.

Then I joined RBANM’S PU college where I did my PUC. Veneetha Mahajan akka taught me a whole lot of things,like,  How to face an interview, How to speak in Group discussions etc. Sakshi akka was the person who made me realize that I could get First Class in 2^nd PUC. She taught me very well by giving examples for each and every concept so that I could understand the concepts well. Lea aunty gave me an opportunity to do this in real life through the video essay where I spoke in front of foreigners.

I love dancing because of Mythily akka, she taught me how to dance. I did not know that I could dance classical Kathak. However Shubra aunty and Madhulika akka both taught me Kathak. I realized that I can even act through “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” organized by Lea aunty, Brooke and Emily.

I graduated from St.Joseph’s college of commerce. At college, I was struggling through Accounts and Maths. It was Rahul anna, Venkatesh anna and Anand anna who helped me with it. Varun anna helped me with solving Bank Question Papers where he helped me to solve quantitative aptitude, environment related paper, mathematics etc. Now I am able to solve all these papers, myself.I want to thank Zach anna,Chandrashekar anna, Shekar anna, Shakthi akka and Arthi akka They helped me with software skills, like,how to edit videos, music and a lot  about windows moviemaker.

It is my dream to work in a bank, now Sujata Aunty, Bhavani Aunty and Shankar Uncle have made my dream come true.I am very thankful to each and everyone who helped me to grow. ACT has made me achieve my success.

We raised $458 last quarter which was used to pay the fees of 7 children. Help us create many more successes like Veneetha!