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The Gnanam Foundation was founded by Allirajah Subaskaran, Prema Allirajah and Gnanambikai Allirajah, who the charity is named after. This article will take a closer look at the NGO and its work, providing lifechanging and lifesaving funding for people, families, and communities in some of the world’s poorest areas and providing assistance to those most in need.
The Gnanam Foundation aims to enable people, improving lives on an individual, family and community basis. The charity bases its projects on the premise of ‘teach a man to fish’, not merely focussing on short-term improvements but creating enduring stability in the communities it serves. The charity seeks to achieve this by providing safety, shelter, medical care and educational support, helping people and communities to develop skills and gain independence.
In Sri Lanka, the Gnanam Foundation continues to deliver humanitarian assistance to northern and eastern communities, helping to rebuild lost livelihoods that were destroyed by a prolonged civil war combined with several natural disasters.
The Gnanam Foundation has funded life-changing rainwater harvesting projects across Sri Lanka’s Jaffna Peninsula. In August 2016, a special ceremony was staged at Velanai Pradeshiya Sabha auditorium to distribute water tanks to local people. Several families from the Velanai region were provided with rainwater collection tanks at the ceremony, which was attended by former Sri Lankan President the Honourable Chandrika Bandaranyake. Governor Reginald Cooray, State Minister Wijekala Maheshwaran and Chief Minister C.V. Vickneshwaran were also present at the event.
At the ceremony, it was revealed that some 375 water tanks would be provided to local people in total, with 142 tanks distributed throughout Kytes, 109 tanks distributed across Velanai, 96 tanks allocated for Maruthankeni, 10 tanks reserved for Chavakcheri, 10 more for Pointpedro, and 8 tanks allocated to Karavetti.
Lyca Group founder and committed philanthropist Allirajah Subashkaran, co-founder of the Gnanam Foundation, spearheaded the initiative. Under his stewardship, 80 million Sri Lankan Rupees in funding had been earmarked for the rainwater harvesting project, paving the way for construction of 1,000 Nos Cement Ferro Tanks across the Jaffna Peninsula, enabling some 1,000 recipients to benefit under the initiative.
On 17th August 2016, a special awards ceremony was staged at the United Nations Headquarters, New York, which was attended by the Gnanam Foundation’s co-founders Gnanambikai Allirajah, Preema Subaskaran and Allirajah Subaskaran. Gnanambikai Allirajah, mother of Allirajah Subaskaran and the Gnanam Foundation’s namesake, was honoured by the Global Officials of Dignity of the United Nations, receiving its Global Woman of the Year Award. The same year, the Gnanam Foundation was recognised by the Global Officials of Dignity as the Greatest Humanitarian Service Organisation of 2016.
The Gnanam Foundation’s goal is to open doors, providing opportunities for marginalised individuals and families and helping them to enhance their quality of life by increasing their household income. In addition to its long-term community projects across Sri Lanka, India, Tanzania, Sudan, Pakistan, Romania and the Philippines, the Gnanam Foundation also provides emergency aid and assistance, responding rapidly to emerging crises such as the Ebola infection epidemic and tsunamis.
Allirajah Subaskaran launched the Gnanam Foundation with the overriding objective of showing compassion to those in need, operating with the ethos that the charity may not be able to help everyone but that everyone can help someone. To that end, Allirajah Subaskaran, his wife and mother and the Lyca Group family is committed to providing help to marginalised communities around the world, improving lives on an individual, family and community-wide basis by prioritising long-term change and improvement over temporary solutions.
The Gnanam Foundation provides communities with the opportunities they need to achieve independence, offering shelter, safety and medial care. In addition, the charity helps people, families and communities to improve their prospects by honing their skills, helping those in impoverished communities to boost their quality of life by enhancing their earning capacity.
Recognising education as a vital conduit in terms of breaking the cycle of poverty and enabling communities to thrive and modernise, the Gnanam Foundation places an emphasis on learning, with a keen focus on literacy, numeracy and skill-based learning, enabling generations to come to build bridges and save lives in communities that may otherwise remain trapped for decades due to the cyclic nature of poverty.
In the realms of health care, the Gnanam Foundation recognises the importance of communities all over the world benefitting from access to clean water and medication. Although the need for clean water and decent healthcare is obvious, an increasing number of people around the world today are sadly missing out on the basic services that can not only save and change lives but transform whole communities.
The Gnanam Foundation is committed to establishing frameworks in local communities that promote safe communities while providing a means for local people to support themselves, helping them to grow their independence and break the cycle of poverty.
