KRISHNAGIRI: For KM Priyakumari, the road to becoming a revenue inspector was once in danger of ending at the college gate. For N Krishnamoorthy, helping students like her meant holding that gate open.
Priyakumari (27), of K Vetrapatti village in Dharmapuri district, is now a revenue inspector in Tirupattur. Krishnamoorthy is one of the six founders of the ‘With U Educational, Social and Charitable Trust’ in Hosur, a grassroots organisation that has spent more than a decade ensuring that financial hardship does not force children out of education.
For Priyakumari, help came when she was closest to giving up.
Between 2016 and 2020, she was pursuing her undergraduate engineering course and struggling to pay her college fees. The trust paid her Rs 10,000 a year for four years.
Priyakumari says the help she received felt like being pulled from a drowning well. “We were unable to take support from our relatives. My mother worked with the Communist Party, and through that contact, we approached N Krishnamoorthy, following which I managed to complete my degree,” Priyakumari said.
Priyakumari is not the only one.
Her story traces back to a much smaller beginning. It all started with Akila, a self-effacing woman in her late twenties. The year was 2012, recalls S Shenbaga Muthukumar, one of the six founders of the NGO. “There was nothing grand about the beginning. In 2012, Akila, one of our founders, asked us to help support the education of three children with meagre means she knew personally,” Muthukumar explained.
The request came at a time when the founders were already involved in small acts of social service. “We used to individually support destitute people monthly, and organise blood donation camps. All of us reside in Hosur in Krishnagiri.” However, that simple request became a turning point. A small ripple of kindness would gradually spread out, drawing more people into its circle of giving. “We decided to form a trust with the motto, ‘Education is the key to change in society’,” Muthukumar said.
In 2014, the ‘With U Educational, Social and Charitable Trust’ was founded in the bustling industrial hub of Hosur by six members: K Devisona, now a cooperative sub-registrar in the Shoolagiri block of Krishnagiri; her husband, EM Murugesan; friends N Krishnamoorthy and S Shenbaga Muthukumar; S Gopi, a private company employee; and S Akila, a homemaker.
Since 2014, the trust has been accepting new members who contribute Rs 100 a month to support the students. The vision was simple yet profound: that no child’s dream is cut short by financial hardship. The NGO has brought light into the lives of at least 1,000 children in Krishnagiri, Dharmapuri, Vellore, Tiruvannamali, and other districts. And there is something striking in that number: 700 of the beneficiaries are girls.
In a district that continues to lag on several social parameters, particularly those concerning women, the pattern of beneficiaries is telling. The NGO’s intervention has largely been about helping children stay in education and move towards opportunities that might have remained beyond their reach. Krishnagiri’s industrial and manufacturing ecosystem offers them a place to begin.
For Priyakumari, that beginning came after four years of uncertainty over whether she would be able to complete her engineering degree. For hundreds of others, the journey began in much the same way, with the trust stepping in at a moment when financial hardship threatened to decide the course of their lives.
What sets the With U Trust apart is its holistic approach to social welfare. Devisona, the cooperative sub-registrar, explained that the trust gradually expanded its work beyond education. “Initially, we worked for education. In addition, we created awareness against child marriage, and more than 20 child marriages were prevented. A few of our members also spread awareness about the Pocso Act in the initial years, and a few incidents were reported to the District Child Protection Unit, leading to arrests,” she said.
The work, at times, came with risks. One of the trust’s founders, N Krishnamoorthy, was attacked by villagers when he went to prevent a child marriage in tribal areas near the Thalli and Kelamangalam blocks.
The small circle of members that began with a few people has now grown to about 700. Since 2022, members have been paying Rs 200 per month, and around 70 students benefit from the trust each year. G Selvakumar, 28, of Veerachetti Eri, completed his diploma course with the trust’s support and now works at a private company in Bengaluru, earning around Rs 70,000 a month.
Inspired by the trust, Selvakumar started an NGO and now runs awareness programmes on the environment in his village and surrounding areas. The help he once received has found its way to others. But the help he received did not end with his education.
(Edited by Parveen Ali)