Punalur Somarajan

Founder

Founder of Gandhibhavan International Trust

Punalur Somarajan is the founder of Gandhibhavan International Trust (2002)[1], an Indian non-profit working on elderly, mental health, orphans & child care and healthcare from Pathanapuram.

Punalur Somarajan is an Indian social worker and the founder of the Gandhibhavan International Trust, a charity based at Pathanapuram in Kollam district, Kerala, which cares for destitute and abandoned people, particularly the elderly.

He established the trust in 2002 after taking in an ill and undernourished elderly woman he found on the street. By November 2023 the organisation was caring for around 1,300 people.

Early life

Somarajan was born in 1955 at Punalur in Kerala. He lost his mother when he was young, an experience he has cited as the origin of his work with the elderly. He worked as a college teacher.

Career

Somarajan founded the Gandhibhavan International Trust in 2002 and serves as its founder secretary. The organisation runs day-care centres, a home for destitute children, education programmes for children with disabilities, shelters, elder care, addiction treatment and palliative care from its headquarters at Pathanapuram.

Recognition

In 2019 Gandhibhavan received the Vayoshreshtha Samman from the Government of India as the best institution providing services to senior citizens and generating awareness. In 2023 Somarajan was given the Kerala Sree award by the Government of Kerala for social service.[2][3][4]

Gandhibhavan International Trust

Gandhibhavan International Trust, founded by Punalur Somarajan on the banks of the Kallada river near Pathanapuram in Kollam district, shelters and cares for abandoned and destitute people including bedridden patients, people with mental illness and orphaned children. It received the Vayoshreshtha Samman 2019 as the best institution providing services to senior citizens.

Gandhibhavan International Trust reports the following, on its own site: