Koya Mani from Mattanchery is on a mission to help out school students by providing study materials free of cost. Koya and his friends from the 1983 batch of Haji Essa Haji Mussa Memorial School came together for this one goal.
“It all started from a school reunion. The batch of 1983-84 students all met in 2021, just after Covid,” recalls Koya. “That is when one of my advocate friends, T K Navas, suggested the idea of helping financially struggling children by providing them with study materials.”
Thus was born ‘Loan A Book’. And its home base, the little study room where Koya’s daughter prepared for MBBS. Initially, her textbooks and journals were the sole collection here. Fast forward to 2025, Loan A Book has helped nearly 1,000 students from different streams by loaning them the necessary materials for entrance examinations.
The facility’s collection includes study materials for students from Plus Two to professional courses such as NEET (National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test), KEAM (Kerala Engineering Architecture Medical) entrance exam, MBBS, etc.
Firos, an autorickshaw driver and Koya’s classmate from the same school, has been helping him out by collecting the materials from different places, including scrapyards.
“Word of mouth has been how people nearby have come to know about Loan A Book. A student who has previously loaned a book informs her friends who are struggling financially as well,” says Koya, who is an electrician by profession.
From the original study room, Loan A Book has now shifted to a two-storey building in Mattancherry. Our very first contribution was to a civil service aspirant, Koya recalls.
“Now, people from all parts of Kerala come to loan the books. The only condition is that they have to return the books after use, so it can help more students,” Koya says, adding that Loan A Book even has a small collection of fiction. What may be scrap for some can be gold for another.
Fathima Aypha, a BCom student at St Teresa’s College, has been a client of Loan A Book for three years now. “I live in Mattancherry and have been loaning books from here. My two friends and I have been regular customers. Instead of buying new textbooks every year, we loan them. That saves a lot of money,” she smiles.
Koya had to end his higher studies after class 10 due to financial constraints. But now, he hopes that through Loan A Book, students would not have to face the same fate as him and continue soaring and have a bright future.
For Koya and his batchmates, every book returned isn’t just a page turned; it’s a promise renewed that education will remain within reach for every child who dares to dream.