Needy mission for books
“Each and every individual should have a right and desire to read. There can be many difficulties, but non-availability of books shouldn’t be one of them”, says Upul Senanayaka, President of the International Movement for Community Development (IMCD). “This is the fundamental belief of our organization”, he says speaking to the Mirror Mgazine about their ‘Needy Readers’ initiative. The idea for the community came to life at last year’s Youth Fest, where a bunch of active university students got together at a forum discussing the needs of our generation – reading habits being one of them.
“We got to know the immense lack of books, especially in rural areas and we knew we had the potential to eliminate the non-availability”, says Isuru Kalupahana, of the IMCD. “Our ideas were put together at the Youth Fest where we gained exposure for the community”, he adds. Isuru tells us that the initial plan was to collect around 1500 books needed for the ‘Needy Readers’ project, but the message literally went viral and soon the social media was buzzing with their mission. The end result – over 20,000 books being collected.
At a ceremony held at the Siri Sumanajothi Maha Vidyalaya, Thunnana, over 1500 books were donated to the school library. It was truly a moving sight to see the desire for knowledge in the eyes of the little ones as they hopped on stage to collect the books. The Dela Tamil College, Ratnapura as well as the Colambagama College, Nivithigala were also presented with books at the function. Present at the event, Lividul Witharana, a senior activist, and part of the IMCD, mentioned that their aim is to take the community from strength-to-strength and not let is wither away like the many volunteer organizations that have mushroomed over the last few years. “Our group aims at the core needs, and focuses on one problem at a time. We have international support coming in from donors outside the country, as well as healthy donors such as the British School in Colombo”, he adds. Sarasavi and Godage bookshops even prepared special book packs at the Colombo International book fair that could be purchased and donated solely for the IMCD.
Lividul mentions that once the problem of reading deficiency is addressed, they will move into Ordinary and Advanced level seminars for rural schools as well as motivational camps. The creation of the movement was indeed to address the needs that have been turned a blind-eye upon by many, and the members believe that the movement will grow into a major force that reaches out to the under- privileged in due time. In another well thought out move, the movement is willing to revisit the schools and ensure that the kids are taking maximum use out of the opportunity, thus setting the ‘Needy Readers’ project apart from just another donation of sorts.
As the kids of Sumanjothi Vidyalaya relish in the sea of books, the ‘Needy Readers’ project aims to land at many more schools on their journey to inculcate reading habits and bestow wisdom. “From the society, to the society, with the society” reads their slogan, and it couldn’t have been any truer.
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