CELEBRATING with pomp and gaiety the anniversary of someone we love is not unusual. But turning such an occasion into an opportunity for making social contributions is rare. Mr A M Naik, the Group Chairman of L&T, had his birthday on 9 June. To lessen the COVID-inflicted hardships of people, the Construction & Mining Machinery business (CMB) of L&T in Bengaluru celebrated Mr Naik’s birthday in a noble way!

 

The Sparsh Ladies Club, a body formed by the wives of L&T employees, donated as many as 15,200 masks to the Karnataka education department. This, after the state government made facemasks mandatory for pupils appearing in any exam and the subsequent discovery that many students in government-run schools did not have facemasks.

 

Mrs Sandhya Garg and Mrs Nandini Pai, respectively the president and secretary of Sparsh, ceremoniously handed over the masks to Block Education Officer, Mr Krishna and the headmistress of Govt Higher Primary School, Vasanthnagar, Ms Vinoda. Karnataka education department, in turn, distributed the masks to the students of several government-run schools who appeared for the Secondary School Leaving Certificate exam this year.

 

Interestingly, the masks that Sparsh donated were made by the trainees at its Skill Building Centre in South Bengaluru. The Centre was founded as part of L&T’s CSR initiative offering an opportunity to the underprivileged to become self-reliant. With the rise in demand for facemasks, the Centre imparted training to several women in designing, stitching, disinfecting and packing cotton-masks that are reversible and reusable. The trainees have, so far, made over 70,000 masks. Mrs C A Kanthamani of CMB-HR, who coordinates the activities of Sparsh,  also conducted a COVID-19 sensitisation session for the ground-level health workers of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike and distributed masks to them.