A team of seven youngsters from the city has come together to start an initiative called Erumbugal to spread awareness about social issues. Recently, the team organised an awareness programme at Thangal Lake Park, Ambattur, to educate people on how to help the homeless and find them shelter.
From the recently held awareness drive at Thangal Lake Park in Ambattur
Chennai:
The team uses mime as one of their main tools to spread messages. “Action speaks louder than words and when we use mime language as a medium to communicate, the public gets inquisitive about what are we doing. They come to us and inquire about the message we are trying to convey,” says Sandhya.
The team started off with taking career classes for students in their neighbourhood. When they decided to expand their work, they started visiting orphanages and old-age homes across the city. “The requirement changes in such places — some of the orphanages and old-age homes will be in dire need of money and some others needed volunteers to entertain the inmates. We have organised a couple of programmes at old-age homes. The happiness you see in the inmates’ face gives us a lot of content. We talk to them and share our life stories as well,” she tells.
The team activities are broadly divided into three — helping homeless, women empowerment and waste management. The duties are equally divided among the seven core members. “Before planning an activity, we do extensive research to find out the depth of the issue and then come together to plan the awareness campaign. We have around 45 volunteers in our team and most of them are working individuals and a few are students. Our next plan is to register the group and once it is done, we will work on other sections that our group aims for,” adds Sandhya.
The team that includes Manikandan, Thirunvakarasu, Vidya Reshmi, Sharmi Divya, Lavanya and Sathish meets on all Sundays at Thangal Lake Park to finalise the activities.
Sandhya Venugopal, one of the core members, tells us, “A single ant can only do so much, but when they work as a team, they are able to achieve greater heights. Similarly, we as a group came together to create a change in society. Our mission is to help those in need and educate the current generation about the importance of helping others.”
The team uses mime as one of their main tools to spread messages. “Action speaks louder than words and when we use mime language as a medium to communicate, the public gets inquisitive about what are we doing. They come to us and inquire about the message we are trying to convey,” says Sandhya.
The team started off with taking career classes for students in their neighbourhood. When they decided to expand their work, they started visiting orphanages and old-age homes across the city. “The requirement changes in such places — some of the orphanages and old-age homes will be in dire need of money and some others needed volunteers to entertain the inmates. We have organised a couple of programmes at old-age homes. The happiness you see in the inmates’ face gives us a lot of content. We talk to them and share our life stories as well,” she tells.
The team activities are broadly divided into three — helping homeless, women empowerment and waste management. The duties are equally divided among the seven core members. “Before planning an activity, we do extensive research to find out the depth of the issue and then come together to plan the awareness campaign. We have around 45 volunteers in our team and most of them are working individuals and a few are students. Our next plan is to register the group and once it is done, we will work on other sections that our group aims for,” adds Sandhya.
The team that includes Manikandan, Thirunvakarasu, Vidya Reshmi, Sharmi Divya, Lavanya and Sathish meets on all Sundays at Thangal Lake Park to finalise the activities.