After passing the graduation with a Gold Medal, Ramesh hailing from a poor family of Arathi Agraharam village of Salem District joined the articleship for Chartered Accountancy. In 2002, when he admitted his elder sister for some serious illness at Chennai General Hospital, the indifferent and arrogant attitude of the doctors led to the death of his sister. That incident sparked in his mind to get a few doctors from his village to serve the poor people with humaneness.
When he returned to his village, one poor girl Kasthuri with high marks had secured admission in a medical college. As she did not have enough money, she could not pursue her medical course. Ramesh and his family members started collecting money from various sponsors and helped her to join and complete the course. After practising for two years, Kasthuri is now studying MS.
On hearing the news that Ramesh helped Kasturi, many other poor students with high marks started approaching him for support. He got sponsorship from various donors. In the process, he was under confusion whether to pursue his Chartered Accountancy or to help the poor students. At the advice of another poor student Vetrivel, he chose to help the poor students for higher studies, sacrificing his Chartered Accountancy studies. Incidentally, Vetrivel is now an IAS aspirant.
The journey was tough. He wanted to ensure all the poor students from his village got higher education. The financial support from Mr Saidai Duraiswamy (presently the Mayor of Chennai Corporation) and an industrialist Mr R Krishnamurthy (MD of Suryan Pharma) helped many poor students to pursue higher education in various institutions. Later many other sponsors also supported this initiative.
Nearly 150 students are pursuing degree and post graduate courses in various professional and technical institutions. A few of them are pursuing PhD also. 33 students are now preparing for IAS and other Civil Services. Ramesh has arranged sponsorship for preparation of Civil Service Examinations too. A month ago, one of the students, Bhoopathy Raja was selected for Indian Revenue Service (IRS) and he will be joining duty soon.
Ramesh started Mugavari Foundation with some of his village friends as Trustees to take care of this activity. ‘Mugavari’ in Tamil means ‘address’. Through this Foundation, Ramesh wants to give an identity to all poor students with higher Qualification. Out of 150 students, 60 are from his small village. The others are from the neighbouring villages.
More than 30 male students are living under a single roof, the accommodation provided by Mayor Mr Saidai Duraiswamy. All the beneficiary students have pledged to support poor students in the same way, after they get into employment. “My aim is to make nearly 100 IAS and allied civil service officers, to serve the nation with commitment”, says Mr ‘Mugavari’ Ramesh with beaming confidence.
Their website is http://www.mugavarifoundation.org/
and they can be reached through mail mugavariramesh@gmail.com
Source: May 2012 issue of National Ezine PreSense
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