Samarthanam Trust, Pinkathon to.organize ultra-marathon for visually impaired people

Samarthanam, an NGO that empowers people with disabilities in Bengaluru has always stood up for inclusion. They conduct awareness programmes, employment drives along with many other initiatives for welfare of people from the disabled community.

This coming week, Samarthanam is geared up to do something different. They are joining hands with Pinkathon to conduct the first ever ultra marathon for visually impaired people. This marathon, with visually impaired runners, is going to be first of its kind in India.

The 150-km run from Mysuru to Bengaluru will kickstart on 23 January and end on 25 January at a prominent location in Bengaluru. The event will be flagged off by the Honorable Queen of Mysuru, Her Highness Rajmata Pramoda Devi Wadiyar along with Mahantesh G K who is the Founder-Managing trustee of Samarthanam Trust. To add to the excitement, Bollywood star and Pinkathon founder Milind Soman will motivate all the runners.

Mahantesh says the event will be remembered by everyone..The event will honour yesteryears freedom fighter Subhash Chandra Bose as well.

Six visually impaired runners are participating in the run. They are Mala Kolkar, Nandeesha Janardhan, Renuka Rajput, Sunitha ND, Kavya N and Ajay Eranna. All of them are pursuing their higher studies in various colleges and will run along with their guide runners.

This run is exclusively for visually impaired people. There are various reasons that motivated us to do it. One of the primary reasons is to promote awareness of being fit. Even visually impaired people can stay fit and run for long kilometers. All our six runners have a lot of energy and positivity which we want to show to the world. This run is just a beginning for more such marathons to come. We are starting the event on the birth anniversary of Subhash Chandra Bose to commemorate his bravery and heroism which our team also has. The run concludes on 25th which is national voter’s day, upholding the need for every person to vote. Hopefully, we can do this run in other parts of India very soon
– Mahantesh G K, Founder Managing Trustee, Samarthanam

Bhumika Patel is the Head Coach of Samarthanam trust. An accomplished marathoner who works with IBM, this run is Patel’s brainchild. She has been motivating and training all the runners and their guides for the past many months to gear up for the run. The team had recently made a record of becoming India’s first visually impaired athlete’s team to complete full marathon of 42.2-km at the Bengaluru marathon.

This marathon is definitely going to inspire many people to take up running. We all know that a disability is definitely not a deterrent to pursue one’s dreams and aspirations.

ALSO READ: Samarthanam is all about providing opportunities to disabled people!