Madurai: Diwali is a festival of lights and pomp. People of all walks of life make it a point to celebrate this festival. With increasing social concerns, people prefer to lace their celebrations with a good deed. A group of like-minded people started working a fortnight ahead of Diwali to collate whatever they could like money and clothes and distribute them among the orphans and elderly. This year too, they collected the materials but there was a certain delay due to GST and finances were tight.
Padikattugal, a youth forum in the city distributed clothes and sweets to children affected with HIV. They have been doing it for last five years. For the past three years, they set up a stall in one of the textile showrooms to collect money or clothes from people shopping in the textiles outlet. After required money is mobilised, they take the children from orphanages for shopping before the shop opens for public. This year, however, there was considerable delay in collating money and clothes. “We could not take children for shopping. Most of them donate food on Diwali days, but clothes, sweets and crackers make their Diwali which is the reason we collect these goodies for them,” said S Malaisamy, managing trustee of Padikattugal.
In spite of financial constraints, generosity of willing public surpasses the difficulties, quipped V P Manikandan, a social worker in the city. “It is true that money was tight this year but good-hearted people do contribute whatever they can”, he mentioned. On Wednesday, Manikandan along with volunteers and social workers will be visiting couple of orphanages and old age homes to celebrate Deepavali. “More than goodies, the rejected lot of society enjoy company of people. There are some to remember them”, he added.
Even ahead of Diwali, a group of transgenders celebrated the festival with the corporation home for destitutes at Uthangudi. As many as 150 students from Maharishi Vidhya Mandir School, Kovilpappakudi decided to celebrate the festival with differently-abled children. On Monday, they visited Able Kids Special School at Arapalayam. They conducted cultural programmes for these special children and they had a great time together.
Article Source: Times of India