Raindropss flies 50 children and seniors to Tiruchi for Children's Day

Fifty people who have never been on a plane will fly from Chennai to Tiruchirappalli on Children’s Day. Raindropss Charity Foundation is running the trip on Saturday, November 14, as this year’s edition of Raindropss Vaanamae Yellai, its annual first-flight programme for those who could never afford one.

The group mixes generations. There are children from Anandam Education Center, Anandam Special School, Sevalaya and Maatram Foundation, and students on the foundation’s Educate A Child scholarships. There are senior citizens from Raindropss Anbagam. A visually challenged student and a transgender beneficiary are travelling with them.

The Tiruchi route closes a loop for the programme. Over the years, Vaanamae Yellai has flown first-timers out of airports across the state, and with this trip it will have covered every airport in Tamil Nadu.

The flight is only the first leg. From Tiruchi, the group goes to Kallanai, the Grand Anicut, a Chola-era dam that is among the oldest water-regulation structures still in use anywhere. Then it is on to Thanjavur and the Brihadeeswarar Temple, the Periya Kovil, before the whole party takes the train back to Chennai.

Music director A.R. Raihanah, the foundation’s goodwill ambassador, will fly with them, along with Dr V.G. Santhosam of VGP Group and founder Aravind Jayabal.

“For many of us, flying is a routine experience,” Jayabal said. “But for these children and senior citizens, it is a dream they may never have imagined would come true.” What the foundation wants to give them, he said, is not only a first flight but a day of happiness, confidence, dignity and belonging, shared across age, ability and income.