Do You Have an Old Cycle? Give It to This Bengaluru Org to Help Underprivileged Kids

Do you have an old cycle that hasn’t seen the light of the day in ages and is rusting away to waste in a corner of your house?

What if we tell you that it could have a better use in form of a commute for underprivileged children?

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This Bengaluru non-profit organisation is helping kids from economically weak sections of the society to have cycles of their own by fixing old bikes donated by people in the city.

Freedom Pedals is a first-of-its-kind initiative by Anvaya Foundation, a non-profit organisation where they source in used cycles, repair and donate them to these kids.

Started by Sampath Ramanujam after coming across a young girl playing with a cycle that had no pedals or even a horn in 2014, today the initiative is a fully-fledged project under which the organisation has provided 33 children with ‘upcycled’ cycles that they can proudly call as their own.

“Shaila probably had been six or seven at that time. Sitting on the carrier seat, she had been playing with the dilapidated cycle. That incident left a lasting impact which eventually led to this idea,” Sampath says to The Better India.

You may also like: These Housing Society Residents Give Old Cycles to Kids Who Walk a Long Way to School Each Day

Supporting the organisation in the project was Venkatramaiya, principal of a government school at K. Dommasandra, who helped store the 12 cycles they had sourced last year and also used his contacts to arrange for transportation and repair. Anvaya Foundation eventually donated the cycles to the students on Independence Day in 2016.

This year has proved a lot more fruitful for Freedom Pedals. A lot of people living in the nearby nieghbourhoods have approached them to donate their old cycles and as of last Saturday, they have managed to collect 21 cycles.

If you wish to put your unused cycle to a greater use, you can contact Sampath at 9663033699.

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