HYDERABAD: When Mahesh Babu as Harshavardhan in the 2015 movie Srimanthudu adopted a village, we all felt like posting ‘feeling inspired’ on social media and the role was embossed in our hearts for a fleeting time. When Raghuram, a middle-class journalist who spent half of his salary on charity in the movie Aa Naluguru, we all ditched our popcorn and grabbed tissue papers to wipe the tears. Later, we all and moved on the reasoning that such heroic roles are manufactured only on silver screen to move the audience to sell the movie.
But here is Mannem Sridhar Reddy, a middle-class government employee adopting schools, educating kids and spending 60% of his salary on social service and being a real-life hero.
On an unfortunate day, when Sridhar Reddy’s father went to Yadagirigutta Police Station to meet one of his cop friends who works at the station, he was mistaken to be the Sub-Inspector. He was shot dead by Maoists. In this tragic turn of events, Sridhar landed a government job as compensation. Sridhar visited a school in his village and was left with moist eyes and a heavy heart when one of his father’s friends told him about how his late father used to sponsor education to the underprivileged kids.
A little knowledge about his dad’s deeds is all it took to awaken the philanthropist in him. “In 1999, I had adopted a school and spent `90,000 to repaint the school and maintain it. Every year, on August 15, I conduct some activities like sports and other competitions for the students in the school,” he says modestly.
This superintendent in Pays and Accounts department has adopted 34 schools, he says. “I help the schools with infrastructure, water facilities, school bags, books, provisions and equipment for different sports both indoor and outdoor. In the Mukundapuram school, I cleared the bushes from the backyard of the school and taught the students to cultivate vegetables. In their pastime, they learn to do some organic farming. The lunch is sometimes prepared with those vegetables and served,” he shares.
At this juncture, Sridhar Reddy also realised the impact and reach that Social Media has and created a Facebook page called ‘Mana Miryalaguda’ to bring all citizens under one umbrella.
“With the help of this page, I post information about someone/ some institution that needs monetary help. It could be about some medical emergency or sponsoring someone’s education. There are people from the town living in cities or abroad who come forward to contribute to the cause. I keep it transparent on how much I am donating to the cause and how their money is being utilised. The idea is to collaboratively do the needful to people,” he informs about the page.
Says Sridhar, “With the help of Nalgonda district NRI association, we had conducted cancer health checkup. More than 700 people had attended the event, 22 were unfortunately identified with first stage cancer. Today, two among the 22 are doing fine. Most of them were not even aware that they have cancer until they casually walked in and got themselves checked.”
For most of us, ‘Say no to plastic’ is just a fancy slogan we use on environment day. Sridhar fights for plastic-free Telangana in his own way. He has distributed 60,000 jute bags. “I tell people that if they send me a picture of them using tiffin box to bring home meat from the butcher shop instead of plastic cover, I would give them a gift. I have been receiving pictures ever since,” he smiles.
Practise what you preach is a quote, Sridhar strongly advocates. He cycles all the way from LB Nagar to Masab Tank to reach his office. “I save the petrol money and sponsor Kaushik’s education. He is in senior intermediate now. His father wanted him to drop out due to the financial crisis. I could sponsor his education. I feel content when I heard the news that the boy scored 978 marks out of 1,000,” he says with pride.
“With the help of Telangana Cultural Association of Portland, we helped two volleyball players from Mukundapuram Government School students Uma and Shilpa get sponsorship for their intermediate education,” he shares, recalling how a seven-year-old suffering from a major blood-related disease got aid with his and his associates help.
“I could only give him Rs 20,000. I collected Rs 35,000 from my friends and ensured he was treated. He was a cycling enthusiast. I gifted him a cycle once he got cured,” he adds. His future plans include installing a sanitary napkin vending machine in Government Girls High School, Miryalaguda. “If that idea succeeds, I want to install it in other major villages too. Three to four schools need playgrounds, so we are planning to provide a few sports equipment. I am working towards arranging 126 benches for a school in need of it. Like every year, I want to conduct the drawing and essay writing competitions in government schools, where the winners get cycles,” says this Good Samaritan about his wishlist for 2018.