MI had 17,000 special fans rooting for them

On Saturday, over 17,000 children from several NGOs were at the Wankhede stadium to cheer for their home team which played the Sunrisers Hyderabad in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2015. This included 200 differently-abled children seated at the Garware stand.

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The initiative was part of Nita Ambani-led Reliance foundation’s ‘Education For All’ (EFA) in partnership with 14 NGOs.

A total of 414 buses and over 2,000 volunteers were deployed to ferry the children to the stadium and back.

Aryan Dilwari (16), another differently -abled child, said, “Although I was cheering for MI, I was there especially to watch Lasith Malinga play. It is fun to watch cricket with friends from a stadium.”

Continuing in its sixth year now, EFA, which began in 2010, has taken a giant leap forward and has now gained national momentum with the MI dedicating another home match to this noble cause. Last year, around nine underprivileged children were invited to Dubai to watch MI vs Royal Challengers Bangalore. In 2013, around 11,000 children got to see an IPL match at Wankhede Stadium.

Over the past five years, EFA claims to have made various educational provisions for over 70,000 underprivileged children, many of whom had dropped out of school.

mumbai.newsline@expressindia.com