Philanthropy
Variyar held as a principle that he should help anyone who sought monetary aid for medical, educational or wedding expenditure. Assistance and compassion for the poor and the helpless, and a commitment to eradicate poverty were features of his life. He tried always to provide food, clothing and shelter for the elderly, irrespective of their caste, creed and race.
He collected donations totalling 27 lakh rupees for an orphanage, Ramakrishna Kudil, and this was his greatest pride.
Many people benefitted from his philanthropy with regard to education and he received many letters seeking help for buying books, paying tuition fees, making school uniforms and suchlike. He established a primary school, a middle school and high schools for both girls and boys at his birthplace of Kangeyanallur. The two high schools have subsequently been named "Thirumuruga Kirubanda Variyar" in his honour. He also established schools at places such as Kumarasamy Pettai, Dharmapuri.
Read more about this topic: Kirupanandha Variyar
Famous quotes containing the word philanthropy:
“Almost every man we meet requires some civility,—requires to be humored; he has some fame, some talent, some whim of religion or philanthropy in his head that is not to be questioned, and which spoils all conversation with him. But a friend is a sane man who exercises not my ingenuity, but me.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I shall not be forward to think him mistaken in his method who quickest succeeds to liberate the slave. I speak for the slave when I say that I prefer the philanthropy of Captain Brown to that philanthropy which neither shoots me nor liberates me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“... the hey-day of a woman’s life is on the shady side of fifty, when the vital forces heretofore expended in other ways are garnered in the brain, when their thoughts and sentiments flow out in broader channels, when philanthropy takes the place of family selfishness, and when from the depths of poverty and suffering the wail of humanity grows as pathetic to their ears as once was the cry of their own children.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)