These children from TN are committed to their causes

While Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old environmental activist, has been making headlines globally and inspiring children to take up causes to improve the quality of their and others’ lives, closer home, we’ve young crusaders who are spearheading social causes with remarkable drive and determination. On Children’s Day, today, they walk us down this important journey...
Together, they are on a clean-up mission
Deepak and Sahil from Chennai’s government school, CMS MMDA – 1, have a simple mantra that everyone can learn something from — keep your surroundings clean. Deepak and Sahil are among over 30 Class VIII students from the school who have been taking up clean-up drives, under the guidance of social enterprise Reap Benefit, over the course of the past eight months.
The duo was also part of a massive post-Deepavali clean-up, where they cleared 45kg of waste from the streets of Arumbakkam. “When we saw the roads, we were affected by the garbage. We also realised that we could solve the problem if we got together. We felt happy and proud that we got to be a part of this,” Sahil says, adding that he will continue the good fight.
Cleaning campaigns apart, students of the school have also come up with creative solutions for civic issues through installations of waterless urinals, bins for waste segregation and switchboard organisation to save electricity. Deepak, who aspires to be a lawyer in the future, adds that he was immediately drawn to such activities when it was announced. Ask him why and he says, “who better to clean our litter than ourselves?”

His weekends are dedicated for collecting seeds
Nine-year-old Naren Villuri picked up an interest in collecting seeds after he started attending plantation drives within Mahindra World City, where his family resides. His mother, Kalpana, says, “The first round of plantation happened last year over a period of four weeks and he planted 154 saplings. Soon after that, a nursery was started within the Mahindra World City. There, they encourage kids to collect seeds and give their collection to the nursery. All this motivated him. Since then, once a week, he has been going from house to house within our housing society and collecting seeds.” Naren says, “I talk to the residents and tell them why they shouldn’t throw away the seeds along with other waste. Last summer, I collected close to 5,000 tamarind seeds from our native place in Visakhapatnam, and brought them here. Here, I collect seeds of fruits like mangoes, dates, lemon, etc. So, far I would’ve collected and given close to 7,000 seeds to the nursery.” He also collects eggshells so that it can be used as manure.
Kalpana says that he has been invited to educational institutions to organise plantation drives. “In fact, he met people from IIM-Trichy to organise a green drive on its campus,” states Kalpana and adds, “He has held a workshop on making seed balls for a corporate entity.”
Rallying for rivers is Neelanjan
Neelanjan D is a Class III student of My School Global, Palavakkam (Chennai). He has already been active in the environmental causes scenario, especially, campaigns to save rivers. His mother, Sarada, says, “I volunteer at the Isha Foundation. Obviously, that influenced him, and it was only a matter time before he started showing interest in doing things in his individual capacity. So, when the Cauvery Calling campaign was initiated, he wanted to create awareness among his schoolmates.” Neelanjan says, “An informal meeting was held in school and there, I spoke about the importance of saving our rivers, following which we also held out posters of the campaign and posed for photos.” Ask his mother if he has plans to take his awareness campaign to other schools and she replies, “I think he’s too young to do that yet. But I think he has keen interest in this social cause. So, if I take the initiative to accompany him, he’ll sure be willing to do it on a bigger scale.”

Creating awareness on mental health
Mohammad Ibrahim, a Class XI student, has been actively taking part in different social causes since a very young age. From collecting clothes for underprivileged and homeless people to actively taking part in environmental causes – he has been social crusader. He has also been helping out different NGOs with his skills in photography and poster designing. He says that he also works among, and for, the mentally ill patients. “I conduct workshops in various parts of Tamil Nadu to educate and create awareness about mental health. I’ve been participating in mental health programmes since 2012. My mom is an inmate of BALM - Sundram Fasteners Centre for Research and Social Action in Mental Health. Having seen the issue so closely in our family, I understand the subject well and that’s how I started spending time with NGOs and centres working on mental health in the society. For the Mad Pride Parade 2019, I designed posters, took photographs and walked along with others to create awareness.”

Child rights advocate
M. Dhanalakshmi, a Class XII student from EVR Nagammaiyar Corporation Girls Higher Secondary School (Madurai), will be representing Tamil Nadu at the 30th anniversary of United Nations Convention of Right of Child. It will be organised by the Forum for Promotion of Child Participation in Delhi this month. She has been a part of the Sakthi-Vidiyal Child Rights movement. So far, she has helped stop three child marriages in Madurai. “One of my friends got married when we were in Class X. Unfortunately, we couldn’t stop that marriage. That incident spurred me on to start an awareness campaign among people. That’s how I started associating myself with Sakthi Vidiyal in Madurai,” says Dhanalakshmi. She adds, “Children constitute 40% of India’s population and children’s rights are still not taught to them. I have also been organising Right to Education programmes.”

His mission is to motivate others with his speeches
16-year-old Sabari Venkat from Coimbatore is someone who has won several accolades for motivational speeches. The class XII student of Yuvabharathi CBSE school has delivered over 200 inspirational speeches in schools and colleges all over Tamil Nadu. Sabari, who is visually challenged, was awarded 'Creative Child with Disabilities' national award by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment in 2015. He says, “I feel glad that I am able to give motivational speeches and inspire people. I usually speak about Swami Vivekananda. I was inspired by his speeches and I read a lot. Once I began giving speeches, I was happy that I could finally do something useful to the society.”

A crusader for homeless animals
This six-year-old animal lover is a regular at pet adoption drives. Hannah Preethi Victoria has been quite active in encouraging people to adopt abandoned and homeless animals. “When my mom organised an adoption drive at home for the first time, a lot of people who came were not sure of adopting the stray pups. Because they thought such dogs were not child friendly. But wherever I go, I always play with stray dogs. That changes people’s perception about stray animals. Now, many turn up whenever my mom organises adoption drives of homeless animals.”