Vibha DreamMile––Running to Make a Difference
A picture is worth a thousand words. On September 19, Facebook lit up with thousands of pictures worth millions of words, echoing the motto of Vibha DreamMile––a few miles for a million dreams! There were pictures of families in DreamMile shirts, serious runners sprinting their way to the finish, grandparents showing off their trophies in their age categories, and volunteers with wide smiles. All of them had one thing in common––a sense of purpose, and the determination to make a difference!
The adult volunteer team of Vibha. (Photo: ByteGraph)
On that glorious Fall Saturday morning, all the participants made their way to The Collections at Forsyth and were greeted in festive surroundings by attentive volunteers. By 7.45 am the venue was bristling with anticipation and excitement, with the 10K runners doing their warm up jogs and others participating in the exercise routines. The 10K race was promptly kicked off at 8 am by Naveen Miglani, Co-Founder of Splash BI Technologies. The 5K run was flagged off at 8.15 am by Ram Ganeshan, CEO of Datum Software and Dr. Veena Bhat of North Fulton Smiles. When Ramesh Maturi, co-founder of Pyramid Software and Rob Thomas (SVP Global R&D) of Manhattan Associates flagged off the huge contingent of 5K walkers at 8.20 am, the sight of hundreds of participants walking past the start line was truly inspiring.
“Every year, all the volunteers work hard to make the DreamMile the best ever and this year is no exception. We have beaten all targets––both in terms of fundraising and the number of participants. On behalf of the volunteers, I sincerely appreciate all the sponsors, donors, and participants for making the DreamMile 2015 the best ever!!” beamed Kishore Krishnan, the event coordinator for 2014 and 2015.
The Chief Guest for the event, Michael Williams, GA State Senator representing the Forsyth County, addressed the gathering and congratulated the volunteers and participants for being part of DreamMile that is helping global and local communities. He gave away the volunteer awards and the youth awards. Durgesh Das, the Atlanta Action Center Coordinator was given the “Volunteer of the Year” award. Prasoona Kota, the volunteer Management Coordinator and Kishore Krishnan received the special Recognition awards. “Youth Volunteer of the Year” was given to Jai Mareddy from Alpharetta High School and the Star Youth Award was given to Rohan Srivastava from Chattahoochee High School. Dr. Veena Bhat of North Fulton Smiles was thanked with an appreciation plaque for all her support over several years. The results for all events can be viewed at www.dreammile.org/atlanta.
DreamMile is a much anticipated event for participants and volunteers alike. Vibha currently supports 30 projects spread in 11 states of India and 6 projects in USA, reaching more than 50,000 children. Some of them––Sikshana (Bangalore) and Door Step School (Pune)––have been scaled up and also replicated in other states of India. For a full list of projects and to contribute to the cause, please visit www.vibha.org.
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