With its launch today, India’s COVID-19 vaccination drive is the largest of its kind in the world. The District of Ernakulam, Kerala and Amrita Hospital have formed a unique Public-Private Partnership (PPP) to vaccinate health care workers there.
The voices of both women and men from villages across India were heard as they made the decision to take part in UN Women’s “Orange the World: End Violence against Women and Girls”. Working with our UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality & Women’s Empowerment, the villagers rang out messages about the urgent need to denounce gender-based violence and called for unity and activism.
Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham has become the first Indian university to partner with the European Union’s Human Brain Project. There are 143 universities in Europe working together to understand brain function and develop solutions to better comprehend and cure brain diseases. fMRI techniques are used widely, but to connect these signals to the underlying activity of brain cells or neurons is challenging.
VIDEO: For the first time in more than 30 years, Amma has not been able to travel on her international tours due to COVID-19. Usually Amma travels to Europe in the fall, so this year the volunteers found another way to make a difference in the world at this challenging time. They held a charity walk that represented the 9,000 kilometers between them in Europe to Amma in India. At the end of the campaign, 1,800 people in 13 countries took part and walked 67,500 km.
VIDEO: In villages across India, women and girls fetch water on a daily basis from the nearest sources, often carrying the heavy loads in pots upon their heads over long distances. This leaves little time for other needs such as education, earning additional income, being with their families or even getting sleep. Recognizing the hardship they undergo, Amma has made it a priority to ensure accessible, clean and dependable water sources in villages across the country.
Stanford University, one of the world’s leading teaching and research institutions, has ranked five scientists with Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham among the global top 2% in their respective fields. Stanford acknowledged Dr Maneesha Ramesh, Dr Shanti Nair, Dr R Jayakumar, Dr N Radhika and Dr Madhav Dutta for the quality of their research.
Volunteers with Amma Mexico in Cancun were accustomed to holding regular soup kitchens to help people living in poverty in their area. However with social distancing as the main concern, the coronavirus pandemic has put that action on hold. To bridge the gap, the volunteers are preparing boxes of groceries and basic necessities to drop off at people’s homes.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 67th birthday of Amma was celebrated on September 27th exclusively as a day of global prayers for world peace. Ashram residents and devotees around the world dedicated the day to meditation, chanting of prayers and worship. During a webcast, Amma said there is no need for guilt or fault-finding for the current state of the world. Instead, humanity should engage in noble action with intense alertness and courage.
Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham has been awarded a UNESCO Chair for Experiential Learning for Sustainable Innovation & Development. The Chair supports the university’s mandate to strengthen sustainable development in villages across India. The curriculum is based upon the concept that students spend time with villagers to witness the problems they face. Together, the students and local people seek solutions that will best suit the villagers’ needs.
AYUDH Kenya has partnered with Safaricom to distribute white canes to 20,000 blind and visually impaired people in Kenya. The project is worth more than $250,000. Safaricom is a leading communications company in Africa that works in partnership with communities to positively transform people’s lives. The endeavor is a milestone for the White C(r)ane Project, which AYUDH started in Kenya in 2014.