The Hindu : Their mission is to serve the home

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Feb 06, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Their mission is to serve the home

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI, FEB. 5. "But for the home, I would have languished in my village in Thanjavur district," says a senior bank officer.

"Had it not been for the home, I would have been a purohit earning a few rupees," said a retired college professor.

They were residents of the Ramakrishna Mission Students' Home. It is in a relatively quiet lane in the heart of Chennai and may be mistaken for a wealthy man's house.

The building with its stately circular pillars, tiled roofs and well-groomed gardens has been home to thousands of poor and destitute boys from various parts of the State for a century now.

Some of its former residents still serve their residential school, which stood in relative wilderness in the early part of last century.

"I can recite all 18 chapters from the Gita, thanks to the swamijis of the mutt," says B. Swaminathan, general manager, Indian Overseas Bank. A resident of the home from 1962 to 1966, he said, "I came to the home from my village with just a pair of dhotis and shirts. I did not have even chappals. But after coming here, there was no looking back."

There has been little change in the way the boys live in the home today. They sleep on bamboo mattresses on the floor in dormitories. A resident's possessions fit into a suitcase. A student is given a bucket and a mattress. "If you are lucky you have a pillow," said K.S. Ramachandran, a retired professor, who was a student of the home from 1948 to 1953.

Residents are part of the family which includes former residents who attend to the needs of the home.

"When students enter the home, there is no pressure on them to leave it for vacations. Students can take courses during holidays," says S. Jagannathan, a former resident-turned-principal.

The boys learn responsibility, discipline, self-reliance and the maturity to make decisions during crisis. Students buy grocery, clean toilets, maintain the gardens and care for fellow students when they fall sick.

"I was sent to villages with a staff member to collect milk from the villagers for the students of the home. We had to cross the Palar every day," recalls Mr. Ramachandran of his life at Uthiramerur. Students were evacuated from the home here during World War II and lived in thatched huts at Uthiramerur.

The students have set up a water turbine for their engineering project. The technical institute trains the boys at the machine shop. They get hands-on experience on donated machines. The present batches of students are given training on computers. The home, which runs completely on donations, had to give away some of its lands to the Vivekananda College sometime ago to enable the college to accommodate more students.

Former residents have set up alumni chapters in various cities and meet every year during the home's annual day to exchange notes. A former student has set up a service centre for buses and trains the home's students, says Mr. Jagannathan.

M.K. Balasubramanian, former commissioner, Hindu Religious Endowment Board, said: "Melkaranai in Villupuram district was an economically backward village and I had to struggle for elementary education. I went to my grandfather's house to study. I studied in Gingee up to the seventh standard. The teachers there suggested that I go to the Ramakrishna Mission Students' Home. I studied there from 1936 to 1944, till I finished college."

Initially, the school took in students from well-to-do families but the practice was abandoned. Today orphaned, poor and destitute boys above 11 years are admitted to the residential school attached to the home. "The only criterion is that students should live by the principles of the Mission," say the monks of the Mutt.

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