On being informed of the plight of young windows from the Rameshwaram fishermen community, Our Chairman Dr. AR Savarimuthu, set out to find out further details and figure out ways to solve these issues.

The situation he discovered there was more dire than he had anticipated.

More than 600 young women (some younger than 25 years old) with multiple children have been widowed in the small island town. Most of the widows lost their husbands to Sea Accidents, Drugs and Alcoholism or Suicide due to extreme poverty.

Life is already exceptionally difficult in the best of times for the fisherman community. Owing to very old customs and practices, these widows are completely ostracised from public life. They are mostly forced to wear only white, cannot attend family events such as weddings, engagements etc. are not allowed to work, cannot wear any form of jewellery and much more.

The Mother Teresa Foundation has decided to take this up as a project, to bring upliftment to this community. With the help of local organisers and support from the local community, we have already set up a new community welfare organisation to get things started.

In addition to this issue, it was found that there was a severe lack of awareness among parents of young women/girls regarding job opportunities which results in them being married off at a very early age. (Read More about this…)

We hope to make an impactful change to this community in the near future.