Marudam

Context

Marudam or The Forest Way functions as a registered charitable trust in Tiruvannamalai district in Tamilnadu involved in afforestation, organic farming, education and running of public parks. Covid relief work started around July 2020 where we worked to provide food, medical and education support to communities.

Socio-Economic Profile

Most of our work was in the rural regions though we did reach out to the urban marginalized people too. In Chennai we worked in the poor settlement areas, fishing community groups and with migrant workers who were stranded. Totalling to around 3700 people and counting now.

Strategies

Our school continued working through the last two years with occasional breaks when Covid was severe or apprehension of Covid was severe locally. We now work partially with direct contact classes for local children and online classes for children who come from far away.

We also ran a learning center for neighbourhood children who either went to government schools or private schools but that stopped during the summer months. It has begun to revive now. The learning center for the village kids was entirely run by parents and some teachers of our school on a voluntary basis.

We also are running some educational interventions in the gypsy colony recently rehabilitated.

Numbers Impacted

Food ration support was provided to 1400 families in the first round and currently, 2300 families and counting.