Rantharu Children Society - Sayurupura Flats

In honor of my sportsmanship, the house offered by the Government of Sri Lanka under the guidance of the former Hon. Sajith Premadasa was a blessing from fate. 53 internationally acclaimed athletes live in this housing complex, with more than 300 people living in lowincome families who have lost their homes due to the tsunami and sea erosion. On the very first day that I was given the house and brought to show it, my mother, father and brother refused to live here. It is because of the dirty environment and the behavior of the ignorant people. But my point was the opposite, I wanted to live here. I felt I felt that this is the best place to start the change. But it took me months to change the minds of my family. At last they also agreed. That is why we started living in Sayurupura Flats. Before moving here, I already had a plan. Its ultimate goal is to make the environment clean and improve the living conditions of the poor children living here.

My work Shortly after we moved into our house. I met Jayasanka, the Assistant Development Officer of the Ministry of Urban Settlement and construction, whom to which I said that I wanted to start a children’s club. He was very happy to hear that. He stated that it would take few days to inform the senior officials and to get necessary facilities and permissions. In the mean time my father, mother and I went to the lower floor with two brooms and necessary equipment. We swept in and around the entrance to the flat. People in the flat saw this as a miracle. After few minutes, few of them joined us. There are some places that we can’t clean. For that my mother, my neighbor Shani aunty and I went to house by house and collected Rs.100. Some gave the money without hesitation. Few others was not willing to give the money and others did not give at all. About Rs.7000 was collected. Two labors were given the money to clean up the places which we can’t clean. The elevator was contaminated and my father got a labor to clean it using my father’s money. The ministry has approved to set up the children’s club next week. Sir Jayasanka printed the leaflets made to inform people about the children’s club and gave it to me. My mother, Chamara ayya, and I went to each house and distributed the leaflets. Additionally I created a poster and pasted few on the walls with my father. Our initial effort was a success, about 75 children attended. M.Jayasanka’s proposal was that I should accept the secretary post. I was elected as the secretary unanimously. The name of the children’s club 4 year ago was adopted to this year too, which is ‘Rantharu Lama Samajaya’. Then other officials were selected. That was it for the first week. Prior to our second term our club, we cleaned around the Lord Buddha’s shrine and in front of the community center with the participation of our club’s officials. At the second term I produced a vdeo clip with photographs of the comitee members, using my father’s projector.

It was a refreshing experience for many

I also created and showed a video clip about the value of helping each other. It was something that children enjoyed

Then I was concerned about a problem that children who go to school have. I thought it would be nice to give them school books and equipment they need. I told that idea to Mr. Jayasanka. He replied telling me that he will discuss about this with the ministry. It flourished. We planned to distribute books to the children as our project. First the ministry of Urban Settlement and Constructions has agreed to provide all funds for this purpose. Few official from the ministry were sent to our flat to gather information about children. A total of 223 students were given school bags, books and stationary by the officials from ministry. It was a very happy day for me. My first attempt was successful even more than I thought.

Next committee members got together and discussed about future plans. Our next project is plant flowers in groups. Its goal is to stop irregular disposal of garbage. Our goal is to place flower pots targeting garbage disposal sites. Also, I’m hoping to show the movie ‘I am Kalam’ in the future just as a start to change the mindset of the children