Several people who really want to reach out to the less fortunate but don’t have direct access to the destitute shelters are now logging on to www.armofjoy.org. No matter how far you are, this new kind of event management facilitates you to donate to people you have never met in your life, putting smile on their faces. A two-member army comprising an enthusiastic couple from Kozhikode is scripting success by being a platform to connect the sponsors and destitute people. As many as 55 programmes have been conducted by ‘Arm of Joy’ in destitute homes in a span of just eight months.
The whole idea of ‘Cultivating Smiles’, as their catchword describes, started from the couple’s college days, when they met, say Anoop G and wife Rekha Das. OISCA youth forum drew Anoop closer to charity, whereas Rekha had her first experience in philanthropy while donating her first earned money for a dance competition to the children of a destitute home in Eranhipalam.
The couple realised that there are so many like them who want to spend the most important days of their life with the less fortunate people in society. Birthdays, wedding anniversaries, death anniversaries and even weddings are now being celebrated by creating smiles on the faces of the poor.
The couple got a good response around six years ago when they told their friends through email that donations were welcome to buy books for a juvenile home library to celebrate the first birthday of their son, Madhavan. “Around Rs 50,000 was collected in just one week. That was a surprising response. Later, Bindu, a friend of mine from California, sent me Rs 30,000 for the poor children in Kozhikode, seeing my interest in charity through some activities posted on Facebook. Following her, many other friends, whom I had contact through several reunion groups, also started sending money for the poor. After money started flowing from many sources all over the world, we were compelled to register as an NGO,” says Anoop.
They make sure that the money reaches as a service or as product to the poor and not as cash. “Our main concern is the person or people who donate and their complete satisfaction. We are not running a charity, but our input is our time and dedication. The rest is done by the good souls around,’’ says the couple.
There was criticism in the beginning when, on their eighth wedding anniversary on January 28 last year, they announced that they were publicising their charity initiative. Rekha has a her word for the critics: “Anyone who wishes to donate can reach us. The money is not being spent from our pockets, we are just a platform and it is necessary to promote Arm of Joy, so that more people, who are hesitant to directly give their share to society, can do so. And each and every transaction and how each and every paisa is spent will be detailed on the website, to make it transparent to the core.”