Lighting the Way

The first thing Aarthi noticed about Kerala was not the lush greenery or the backwaters people romanticise in postcards. It was the children. Inside a modest government classroom in Kochi, students sat shoulder to shoulder, repeating lessons in unison while volunteers drifted in and out of the school. Aarthi Veerupillai  had arrived from London as a volunteer with the organisation Global Vision International (GVI) intending to stay briefly, teach a few classes, and return home. Instead, she found herself captivated by the warmth of the people, the chaos and charm of Kerala’s schools, and the possibility that education could be something more than textbooks and exams.

“I came with no real plan,” she recalls. “But those first few months in Kerala were some of the happiest days of my life.”

The unexpected journey would eventually lead to the birth of the Olimalar Foundation, a Kochi-based initiative focused on mental health, social-emotional learning, and life skills education for children.

At the heart of this story is not just one woman’s decision to stay back in India, but also the friendships and shared purpose that helped shape an organisation now impacting hundreds of young people.

Among the people she met early on was George, a local programme coordinator who quietly became one of the most important figures in her journey. Long after work ended, the two would sit talking about ideas, music, and the future of education in Kerala.

What struck her most about George was not simply his work ethic, but his kindness. He treated everyone, whether they were children, teachers, or volunteers, with the same respect. She remembers small moments vividly: ensuring a child always walked on the safer side of the road, listening carefully when students spoke, never raising his voice.

“We worked perfectly as a team,” she says. “I would plan things and dream up ideas, and George would go and make them happen.” Together, they began designing activities that translated complicated life concepts into simple, engaging exercises for children. Drawing on her communications background, she focused on making emotional learning accessible and interactive.

Initially working in women’s empowerment programmes, she later transitioned into child education coordination, where her focus shifted toward structured life skills and character education. It was during this period that she began connecting the dots between emotional wellbeing, confidence, communication, and mental health.

“I realised how much I would have benefited from these lessons growing up,” she says. “No one teaches children how to handle emotions, relationships, stress, or self-worth.”

But the work came with difficult realities. The organisation they worked with relied heavily on short-term international volunteers. Many stayed only a week or two before leaving. Children formed attachments quickly, only to experience repeated goodbyes.

“There was no continuity,” she says. “You couldn’t create long-term change when people were constantly coming and going.” She also became increasingly uncomfortable with the “saviour mentality” she sometimes witnessed among the management. Despite raising large sums to help children, very little of that money directly reached the schools or children themselves.

Then came an even bigger shock. After nearly a decade of operating in Kerala, the organisation discovered it had never been officially registered in India. Staff and volunteers had unknowingly been working on tourist visas,  an illegal arrangement that triggered panic after one volunteer was stopped at immigration.

Suddenly, everything stopped. Schools closed their doors to the programmes. Projects were abandoned midway. With a heavy heart, Aarthi left Kerala and returned to London, fearing she might never be allowed back into India if she stayed.

“It felt like fleeing,” she says. “The hardest part was leaving the children and the schools without closure.” Back in London, life moved in an entirely different direction. Her parents needed financial support, and she returned to the corporate job she had already resigned from twice before. For two years, she worked intensely to help settle their mortgage and buy them a home.

But Kerala never left her mind. Even while working in London, she spent her evenings researching education models, mental health programmes, and social entrepreneurship. She joined a startup accelerator to learn how to build an organisation from scratch and trained as a mental health educator.  She also reached out to organisations such as Dream a Dream, known for its work in social-emotional learning in India.

By February 2020, she was ready to return. She resigned from her corporate job once again, this time never to return. Kerala was calling her back.

Then the pandemic arrived. The lockdown disrupted her plans to travel, but it also sparked a new beginning. Determined not to lose momentum, she launched “LifSkool” online on March 31, 2020.

What began as small mental health videos and breathing exercises soon evolved into something much bigger. Working remotely with George in Kerala, she organised fundraising initiatives to support local schools struggling during the pandemic. One project, called “Zoom-tastic,” brought together circus performers and artists from around the world for a virtual fundraiser that helped provide mobile phones and learning materials to children unable to access online education.

Soon, Lifskool was running summer camps, WhatsApp sessions, and structured weekly programmes for students across Kerala. Slowly, shy children who initially refused to switch on their cameras began participating confidently. To support the sessions, she designed a 10-week curriculum focused on emotional wellbeing, communication, resilience, teamwork, and self-awareness.

Yet criticism followed. Online trolls questioned her credentials and dismissed her as unqualified. Instead of discouraging her, the backlash pushed her toward formal teacher training. She enrolled in the Teach First programme in the UK and worked in low-resource schools, an experience she describes as a “baptism by fire.”

“That experience changed me,” she says. “It taught me how to genuinely connect with young people.”

They also received a third director, Anumol, who worked as a school teacher. As the initiative grew, another challenge emerged: the name “LifSkhool” was already trademarked. After endless brainstorming sessions, inspiration came unexpectedly through Tamil music lyrics. They discovered the word “Olimalar”, combining “Oli,” meaning light, and “Malar,” meaning flower.

The name reflected the organisation’s philosophy perfectly: children flourish when given the right environment, care, and guidance. The Olimalar Foundation was officially registered on October 3, 2024. Today, the foundation works closely with schools and communities in Kerala, conducting structured sessions focused on social-emotional learning and mental health. Rather than concentrating only on high-performing students, the programmes intentionally support children who need additional emotional and behavioural guidance.

Sessions currently run twice a week over five-week cycles, combining storytelling, reflection, creative activities, and discussion-based learning. The foundation has also launched “LifConnect,” a parent engagement initiative designed to create stronger support systems for children beyond the classroom.

Recently, Olimalar collaborated with Saturday Art Class to train local teachers in social-emotional learning through art. The programme culminated in a public exhibition showcasing students’ work and emotional expression.

So far, the organisation estimates it has reached nearly 3,000 people through workshops, school programmes, and community initiatives. For her, however, the biggest milestone was deeply personal. Her father, once worried about her unconventional career choices, recently looked at everything she had built and said he could hardly believe it all started from her bedroom. “It meant everything to me,” she says.

Now settled in Kerala once again, she dreams of expanding Olimalar into a sustainable, community-led ecosystem for children’s wellbeing. Plans include training more local educators, building culturally relevant mental health curricula, and creating long-term programmes rooted in creativity and emotional safety.

At its core, Olimalar is not simply about education. It is about helping children feel seen. And perhaps that is exactly why Kerala,  the place she once arrived at with a one-way ticket and no plan,  eventually became home.