India – Church of South India – CMS College and more rain

Acclaimed as the land of letters, latex and lakes, Kottayam, a small town of 50,000 people, has the distinction of being the first fully-literate municipal town in India, and the municipality also boasts of CMS College – the first English educational centre in South India.

Today, the heavy rain has continued and educational establishments have been given a day’s holiday because many of the surrounding feeder villages where students live are flooded. I was fortunate to meet with a group of about 50 student National Service Scheme Volunteers. NSSV is a nation-wide programme that enables undergraduate students to offer their time voluntarily for the first two years of their course to assist in the work of local charities. The students who shared with me were first-year students.

A few of the second years were also present, and they had volunteered during the Kerala Floods of last year when the CMS College campus became an evacuation centre. “We worked eight-days straight”, said one of them, “And all the restaurants donated food. Everybody unaffected shared what they had”. Over several days, people gathered from the surrounding settlements and at the peak of the floods about 350 people sought refuge on campus. “It started with 20 people and then more and more came until about 180 families were here”, added another student.

The session ended early because the students, 90% of whom travel to college by bus, had to leave to ensure that they got home safely in the heavy rain.

Julia

kochi highest rainfall yesterday of indian cities

self explanatory

nssv 2nd year students with lecturer pink

surrounding fields to kottayam town