The year: 1979. Seven friends in Mumbai, inspired by a young 25-year-old Air India purser Rippan Kapur,contributed Rs 7 each to register cry (Child Relief and You), a charitable trust for underprivileged children. That was a time when Rippan's mother pitched in by giving up her dining table to the enthused youngsters' cause. Two decades later, the family has grown, with more than 65,000 individuals working to change and improve the lives of 8,00,000 children all over the world. "I felt disgusted at the way some children were growing up in India. I realised that I couldn't just stand back and do nothing about it"—these were the words of Rippan, the founder of the organisation.Rippan died in 1994, but not before he'd given wings to a great flight of conscience. The only full-time worker when he started out, his first fund-raising event—Buy a Brick, Build a School—was meant to sensitise school children to the problems their less-privileged counterparts faced everyday. A year later, the cards division was born, with two designs by painter Sanat Surti. The response was tremendous—more than 30,000 cards were sold within a few days. Two years later, Rippan hired his first regular employee Nirmala, and his mother's dining table was officially declared to be cry's office.Today, cry cards have traversed millions of homes all over the world, bringing in their wake joyful smiles on young faces. The journey continues, and Shades of Hope—cry's millennium range of cards, diaries, address books, planners and desk calendars—works of both known and not-so-well-known artistes and children—has recently been launched. The organisation also held anexhibition in New Delhi to celebrate two decades of partnership and the spread of awareness. Their motto, 'one cry card is equal to a day's education for a child', highlights their aim to reach out to thousands of children for whom school and a home are just a dream.cry's success story is one of sensitising people, of making them realise that change is possible, and to show them how to enact that change. With more than 314 child development initiatives across 17 states in India, donations and sales of crystationery products helped support 1,406 transit schools, 965 pre-primary centres and 2,710 physically challenged children in the last year alone. In addition to this, 113 government schools were activated, and thanks to the commitment cry has generated among people, an amazing 118 villages were declared 'child labour free'. Buoyed by the response, cry now plans to raise the number of children under its protective umbrella to a whopping one million. It's a measure of the support Rippan's dream has got thatcry does not accept financial help from any agency, butrather sustains itself on contributions and donations by individuals and the sales of its stationery products. It also doesnot run its own projects, instead it provides both financialand non-financial support to individuals and organisations working with vulnerable children and women. Says Amita Kapur, trustee, "We started with nothing, but today, after two decades, we can proudly say that we have successfully harnessed help from the society and involved people in our movement. Rippan was a sensitive being and always used to tell us that we Indians are responsible for the situation that's prevailing in India. In all these years, thanks to his inspiration, we have remained relevant to our constituencies. But there is still so much more to do. There is no room for complacency." Many others share the feeling. There are instances galore where individuals have come forward to contribute in their own way to be a part of the movement. Gaurang and Meeta Punater of Mumbai, for instance, donated all the gifts they received in cash on their wedding day to cry. Two anonymous couples, on their wedding day, gave a donation of over Rs 25,000 each—they had actually requested their guests not to bring any gifts but give cheques to cry instead. When Chennai's A.N. Sattanathan died, his daughter donated a sum of Rs 69,848, because her father, who'd dedicated his life to children working in households and teashops, had wished so. The vision of persistence, dedication and humility in the cause of children has now been institutionalised within cry. Rippan's dream has learnt to fly. cry can be contacted at: dda slum wing, Bapu Park, Baraat Ghar, Kotla Mubarakpur, New Delhi; phones: 4651732, 4604790, 4693159. n