Providing safe shelter to the homeless poor, particularly women and children, has been a life mission for 57-year-old M.S. Sunil, an academic-turned-philanthropist from Pathananmthitta. And for this, the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development honoured her with the Naree Shakti Puraskar this year.
President Ramnath Kovind presented the award to Dr Sunil at a function held at the Rashtrapathi Bhavan on International Women’s Day. This retired Zoology Professor is all set to donate her 100th house to a homeless woman and her son at Pongalady near Pandalam.
A mud hut for a house
Mary, a middle-aged maid, and her son, Joel, studying in Class 6, have been staying in a mud hut pitched in the corner of a small piece of land at Pongalady for the 10 years.
It was sheer coincidence that made her meet Dr Sunil who was engaged in constructing a charity home in the locality a few months ago. Witnessing the plight of the mother and son, Dr Sunil offered to donate a safe home to them. Dr Sunil has already completed her 100th house for the homeless at Pongalady and it will be donated to Mary and her child in the second week of July.
“Community service is important to me for so many reasons. First and foremost, I take pride in knowing that I am helping to positively affect someone’s life,” says Dr Sunil.
Dr Sunil told The Hindu that she had constructed the 100th house with the award money worth ₹1 lakh she had received from the President, the ₹25,000 cash award she received from The Hindu Group, the prize money of ₹65,000 she received from the Bahrain-based Syro Malankara Society. The total cost comes around ₹2.60 lakh and the remaining fund was her own contribution.
Dr Sunil says she has been donating houses to the homeless with the support of certain good Samaritans. K.P. George, a Non-Resident Keralite settled in the United States, sponsored 10 houses. Knowing about Dr Sunil’s charity home project through social media, Gladys Mirinda, a boxing champion from Singapore, sponsored two houses.
DISHA, a family group in the Arabian Gulf, and the Syro Malabar Society in Bahrain also offered financial support worth ₹2.5 lakh each for constructing 10 houses. Philipose Mar Chrysostum Metropolitan Emeritus of the Mar Thoma Church, P.J. Kurien, Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman; Youhanon Mar Chrysostom, Bishop K.P. Yohannan, and filmmaker Jude Antony also sponsored one house each.
Dr Sunil says setting up a self-contained small hamlet for the homeless poor people is her dream project.