Wheels to ease disability
When Maheswari (20), a polio victim, requested SSK Thiagarajan, a past president of Rotary Club of Dharapuram, D 3202, to help her in some way, little did she realise that she will get a brand-new Scooty, to ease her commute between home and her workplace. The Rotarian sponsored the two-wheeler, specially customising it to support her disability, and presented it to her in the presence of the District Governor P M Sivashankaran, on the World Polio Day.
Maheswari works in a Xerox shop in Dharapuram and is happy and full of praise for Rotary to have gifted her the vehicle that will make her commute far easier and comfortable. “And a big thank you to Rotary for its dedicated efforts in eradicating polio from our country. It is heartening to realise that no more children will be paralysed by this killer virus,” she added, with a teary smile. The day was also commemorated with a rally organised by the club to create awareness about Rotary’s efforts in polio eradication and sensitising people to keep their surrounding clean and free of garbage.
Handwash stations in schools
The club is working earnestly on educating school students about basic hygiene and sanitation. Energised by the loads of ‘thank you’ and cheery smiles from students and teachers at N Chinnaswamy Pillai Municipality HS School for the installation of handwashing station on the premises, Club President S Easwaran is buoyed up to take up the WinS project to more government schools. “It cost us around ₹60,000; we are happy that nearly 500 students are now regularly using the facility and work is underway in four more panchayat schools to provide similar facilities,” he said.
P S Saravana Subbiah, a Rotarian from Erode, provides the handwash facility at a concessional rate of ₹10,000 a unit. The Rotarians impart awareness on handwash and personal hygiene to students at regular intervals. “So far, nearly 850 students from 15 schools have benefitted from our WinS programme,” said Easwaran.
The Club Secretary M Kalidas listed out few other projects being done by the club. These include a play zone costing ₹50,000 set up in a residential locality; regular visit to an old age home, cheering the senior citizens there with utility kits, gifts and nutritious food; and providing stationery materials, school bags and lunch boxes to schoolchildren.
