Welcome to CUP International - by Jaya Koilpillai Bohlmann

One of the first babies was a boy – we named him Kumar. He was brought to us as a newborn, barely breathing, by some workers who had found him discarded in a corner of a clinic in a nearby village. It was 1990, and my parents had just arrived in Hosur, Tamilnadu, India, to build what would become Anantha Ashram, with a set of programs and facilities to house and care for abandoned children and offer them for adoption to good families in India; a medical clinic and community health education classes and outreach. Then, though, they had no way to care for this tiny being, fighting for his life. Some of their helpers, nurses, created a makeshift incubator – really just a box with a lightbulb – swaddled him warmly and fed him and medicated him and held him and watched him around the clock until he stabilized. And then he grew.

Today, Kumar remains part of the Anantha Ashram Children’s Home in Hosur. He is being educated and is helping his “brothers and sisters” in the home – nearly 50 of them today. More than 450 children have been nurtured and cared for by Anantha Ashram.

My parents founded Anantha Ashram to realize a dream of putting public health expertise and knowledge of India to work in this remote area where others didn’t even look at that time. Since then, of course, the city of Bangalore (one hour’s drive from Hosur) and Hosur itself are no longer sleepy “garden” cities – but world class centers of technology and commerce and industry.

Still, the social needs of this ancient culture and the role of women mean more female babies are given up by their relatives who are too poor to care for them – poverty in India remains a dire situation. Girls without education or social standing are often at the mercy of their husbands and in-laws – ill treatment of all kinds is a sadly common story.

Anantha Ashram is funded by the donations of individuals who care about the issues of women, children and India, and is supported by a 501c3 in Maryland, US called Community Uplift Projects (CUP), International. My father, Samuel Koilpillai, is the founder and president. I lead communication.

We are currently raising money for an endowment fund of $25,000 for the older children of Anantha Ashram, like Kumar, who have not been adopted by families who would pay for their higher education, and to whom we are deeply committed to ensure their future employability so they will grow into well adjusted, contributing adults. This is a modest amount, we realize – we have become used to a lean operating budget – it costs about $52,000 US dollars to run all of Anantha Ashram’s projects for an entire year. This includes all paid staff, mostly caregivers for the children, and medical professionals, including doctors and nurses to run the clinic. My parents take no salary for their management role, and the Board of CUP International are fully volunteers.

Please help us by sharing your thoughts and insights about how to grow this Education Endowment Fund, and your encouragement.