The Beginning
The word "Vidyarambam" is derived from the Sanskrit language and it means "the beginning of literacy". This "beginning" does not happen for many children in the world. Specifically, in remote villages of India, there are hundreds of thousands of children who do not have the opportunity or the environment to begin their education.
One reason is that the parents are illiterate themselves. Illiterate parents are not capable of providing basic education at their own homes in contrast to literate parents. Since many illiterate parents are poor as well, even if they want to educate their children, they often cannot afford it. The cost of pre-primary education is beyond the reach of the poor people of the villages whose livelihood depends on day-to-day earning.
Children in the 3-5 age group are very vulnerable. It is the age when parents cannot use their children as labour to supplement their earnings. The children are left to their own devices and often waste their time and energy in futile pursuits. Even a non-formal input about their environment, health and sanitary conditions and the world outside their villages is not provided to the children because the parents themselves are not knowledgeable in these matters.
These are the direct observations of the founder of Vidyarambam who has travelled to many villages in Tamil Nadu. He found that there is an urgent need to provide free-of-cost basic education to as many children as possible. He felt that the children must have quality learning materials including basic alphabet books, picture books, number books, a slate with a pencil, etc. He also felt the need for a tutor to teach the basics. When he shared his strong feelings for such poor children with many of his friends and relatives, they all acknowledged his findings. They realised the urgency with which the opportunity of basic literacy has to be offered to atleast a few of the children in the 3-5 age group.
From this groundswell of support, Vidyarambam was born in 2002. It has been registered as a secular and a not-for-profit organisation in India.
"The beginning" was made at Vattakkottai,
a village in
Kanyakumari District on 02.02.2002
The Founder of Vidyarambam without knowing where and how to start his mission, was walking through a street of a village called Vattakkottai on one of the afternoons. He found a few children wandering and drew them into conversation. When they were asked to say numbers 1,2,3 and alphabet of Tamil or English, they all responded negatively. When he asked them why did they go to school if not for learning, one of the children promptly opened her shoulder bag and displayed a defaced metal plate meaning that they went to school to eat the free food provided there. This event compelled the Founder to make a beginning then and there.