From the streets of Chennai to Europe: Jayavel’s story:
Jayavel was born here, on the streets of Chennai. His parents, farmers from Nellur village in Andhra Pradesh, moved here after severe financial losses buried them in debt that would take them a lifetime to repay. They sold their land and left for the city in hopes that they would find work. However,after months of looking for employment with no success, they started begging on the streets to survive.
Jayavel too started begging, along with his 3 elder sisters and one younger brother. Despite this, his parents were unable to repay their loans.
The family’s misfortune didn’t stop there. Jayavel’s father died when Jayavel was just three. His mother became an alcoholic, making her unable to look after her kids.
Life had been hard, to say the least, for Jayavel, until a chance encounter in 1999.
The founders of Suyam Charitable Trust, Uma and Muthuram, were documenting the condition of street kids in Chennai when they met Jayavel and decided to extend their help to him. Jayavel and his sibling were sent to Siragu Montessori School, which is a special school run by Suyam Charitable Trust for such underprivileged kids.
After this, there was no looking back. After passing class 12 with flying colors, Jayavel appeared for the prestigious Cambridge University’s entrance exam.
Today, 22-year-old Jayavel has done a three-year course in“Performance Car Enhancement Technology Engineering”from Glyndwr University, Wrexham, United Kingdom.
Last September, Jayavel was slated to go to Turin, Italy, to pursue his studies with a full scholarship, but that didn’t work out at the last minute due to external problems with the consultancy. Now, he is going to the Philippines to study Aircraft Maintenance Technology.
“I have taken a loan for my education in the Glyndwr University. Once I finish my course I want to first repay my loan and build a house for my mother. After that I will dedicate my life to work for other street kids by joining Suyam. I owe everything to them,” says Jayavel.
Jayavel is not the only one whose life was transformed by Uma and Muthuram. There are at least 50 odd students below the poverty line, who have benefited with higher education thanks to them. And there are 250 begging families who have been rehabilitated by the trust.
Brothers, once child labourers, now doctors and engineers:
Dhasarathan Rajaramani, 23, is studying MBBS (4th year) in Crimea State Medical University. Dhasarathan’s brother, Dhanraj, is doing a course in Bachelor of Design from Indian institute of Information Technology Design and Manufacture, Jabalpur (IIIT DM Jabalpur).
Both these brothers were working as child labourers in a brick kiln until 2005, when they met Uma and Muthuram.
Uma used to visit these brick factories to spread awareness on child labour, and was able to convince the owner of the factory to let Dhasarathan and Dhanraj come with her.
“I feel proud to be student of Suyam because they gave me everything right from food, shelter and education. Uma Ma’am and Muthuram Sir are like my second parents. They allowed me to choose my career and were always encouraging. What can I say about Suyam… It’s my home, where I learnt everything. I was not born there but I belong to Suyam,” says Dhasarathan, speaking to TBI from Russia.
Meet the people responsible for transforming so many lives:
Uma and Muthuram met in school when they were just in class 1 and had no idea that they would become soulmates in the future.