Smt Girija Shastry Memorial Trust

Smt Girija Shastry Memorial Trust (also known as Adamya Chetana ) is a voluntary organization working since 1998 in the fields of education with Read more Anna – Akshara – Arogya (Food – Education – Health) as its core intervention areas. Adamya Chetana was started in the year 1998 by the late Shri AnanthKumar , in the fond memory of his mother Smt. Girija Shastry as a tribute to her indomitable spirit. It is run by Smt. Tejaswini AnanthKumar since its inception. She is involved in all its day to day work overseeing planning and operations and ensuring quality. Today, Adamya Chetana has crossed many milestones. Over 1.5 lakh school children are being served midday meals every day (over 48 Crore midday meals served till date), health check-up camps for children and adults are organized, “Chinnara Chetana” wall magazine reaches thousands of school children every month. Adamya Chetana has started a mass movement – Sasyagraha for spreading and adopting a green lifestyle with multiple programs under it. Adamya Chetana is also active in various projects in the areas of Child & Women development and Sustainable development of villages.  Mid-Day Meal Programme serving over 1.5 lakh students every day Launched in 2003, the mid-day meals programme at Adamya Chetana serves hot, tasty and nutritious meals to over 1.5 lakh students every day in collaboration with central and state governments. Four kitchens, one each at Bengaluru, Hubballi, Kalaburgi in Karnataka and Jodhpur in Rajasthan prepare and deliver food hygienically using robust processes. A direct result of good nutrition (mid-day meals from Adamya Chetana), attendance in the schools has gone up and both the overall health and learning capability of children in schools has noticeably improved. ·      9 pots (300 litres each) can cook food for 1,000 children in 30 mins. ·      Tasty Bisibele-Bhath, Pulav, Upma, Pongal, Payasam, etc. ·      Work starts early at 4 AM and is completed by 11 AM. ·      Sambar with 2,000 kg vegetables, masala with 800 coconuts and roasted spices, garnished with tadka of Asafoetida, turmeric powder and mustard seeds. ·      Two tankers of nutritious creamy milk for children every day - Milk powder provided by the Government under the Ksheera Bhagya scheme. Not just a kitchen, but a Green kitchen Even while cooking for thousands of children every day, Adamya Chetana kitchen is also a ZERO garbage kitchen . Not even a single kg of garbage is put out in Municipality bins since 2013. Similarly, Adamya Chetana shifted from using fossil fuels like Diesel, LPG to renewable sources like briquettes and bio-gas. The kitchen is completely fossil-fuel free. ·      Removal of garbage bins from the kitchen to start with brought up innovative ways to reduce, reuse and recycle garbage! ·      300 kgs of garbage per day was reduced to ZERO. ·      Fossil-fuel free, using briquettes, biogas. Eliminated usage of 50 LPG cylinders each day   Chinnara Chetana, a colourful educational intervention Chinnara Chetana, a colourful monthly wall magazine for school children (published since 2008), carries thought-provoking and informative articles related to the environment, green lifestyle, etc. written in a very interesting and simple way. Colourful illustrations make it all the more attractive for not only students but everyone to read it. Every year, Adamya Chetana publishes 20 editions of Chinnara Chetana, both in Kannada and English and it reaches hundreds of schools. This wall magazine has been received so well that. Not only school students, but people working in various banks, offices are asking for copies to display in their workplace to share these ideas.  Arogya Chetana – Health camps  Health camps including eye check-up are conducted for children and other citizens. Women are given special attention during these health camps. Arogya Chetana with a focus on providing health cover to the school children was inaugurated by Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam benefiting thousands of school children, providing them hospitalization cover at practically zero cost. SASYAGRAHA: Adamya Chetana’s green lifestyle movement Adamya Chetana runs multiple programmes under the “ Sasyagraha” movement to promote the adoption of Green Lifestyles. ·       Water re-use : Believing in the concept of reuse and recycling, Adamya Chetana reuses close to 10,000 litres of recycled water for plants at Lalbagh Botanical Garden. ·       Grid on solar system : Adamya Chetana was one of the first few organizations to install solar panels on its roof to generate electricity, which has reduced its dependency on external power considerably. ·       Eco-friendly and reusable plate-bank : In many functions or events, plastic or paper plates and cups are used. Sometimes, areca nut-based plates are also used. These disposable plates, cups and cutlery end up polluting the city. Adamya Chetana has set up a unique plate bank with close to 10,000 sets of steel plates, spoons, tumblers, cups, etc. These are used at all Adamya Chetana events. And these can also be borrowed by any organization, educational institution or individuals for their events at zero cost! ·       Green Bharat 1:1 is a program to increase green cover in our cities by having at least 1 tree per person. Since January 2015, every Sunday has been a Green Sunday for Adamya Chetana and its volunteers where hundreds of saplings are planted and nurtured. More than 1.5 lakh saplings have been planted to date. Equally important, many local residents, groups, enthused by the program have started their own tree-planting programmes, thus multiplying the effect of the Green Bharat 1:1 programme. ·       eco-Chetana : This is a platform to promote the adoption of a Green Lifestyle to protect and rejuvenate our environment. eco-Chetana promotes concern for the environment, reducing usage and promoting recycling of resources in all aspects of our life. eco-Chetana organizes exhibitions of Green Lifestyle, demonstrations by experts in various fields like renewable energy, water conservation, recycling, composting, terrace gardens, etc. ·       Nature-Science Internship Programme : “catch them young” if we have to change the mindset of a generation. With this philosophy, Adamya Chetana designed a unique internship programme with extensive fieldwork for youngsters in association with experts from the Indian Institute of Science. During this internship programme, young students under the guidance of their teachers and experts from IISc and Adamya Chetana conduct a number of field studies, lab analyses to map out eco-system in and around their area and try and understand nature. They cover areas like animals, birds, insects, trees, water, food, etc.  Subhiksha Gram – comprehensive village Development After the 2010 floods, Adamya Chetana worked in Ramatheerth and Sankonatti villages in the Athani district of Belagavi in Karnataka and built 165 gobar gas plants and toilets, establishing a cooperative bank, a milk collection centre and carried out extensive tree planting, building few check dams and increasing groundwater levels. More recently, Adamya Chetana worked in the Raagihalli village cluster near Bengaluru on a number of areas including increasing green cover, education, skill development, generating employment opportunities, building toilets, plastic waste management, etc.  Adamya Chetana is a true testament to the “Never give up” spirit Starting small, with little resources, Adamya Chetana has been built by the vision and hard work of Tejaswini AnanthKumar with a core group of staff and hundreds of volunteers. The team built upon each step with more innovations – using the mantras of “think big”, “aim to create impact”. And its results are visible. Walk into its green (zero garbage, fossil-fuel-free) kitchen, or participate in its Green Sunday tree planting or Sree-Chetana, the women self-help group, the energy, commitment and enthusiasm is palpable.