The Mata Amritanandamayi Math (MAM) is an international charitable organization aimed at the spiritual and material upliftment of humankind. It was founded by Indian spiritual leader and humanitarian Mata Amritanandamayi in 1981,with its headquarters in Paryakadavu, Alappad Panchayat, Kollam district, Kerala. Along with its sister organization, the Mata Amritanandamayi Mission Trust, MAM conducts charitable work including disaster relief, healthcare for the poor, environmental programs, fighting hunger and scholarships for impoverished students, amongst others. It also runs the seven-campus university known as Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, 90 chain of English medium CBSE schools known as Amrita Vidyalayam, and classes in yoga, meditation and Sanskrit.
MAM is a volunteer organization, basing its activities on the principle of karma yoga [work as an offering to the divine]. Its headquarters are home to more than 3,000 people, a mix of householders, monastics and monastic students. People make the pilgrimage to MAM every day in order to receive the blessings of Mata Amritanandamayi.
MAM, along with Amritanandamayi’s other centers and organizations throughout the world function collectively under the umbrella title of Embracing the World.
On July 24, 2005, in recognition of MAM’s outstanding disaster-relief work and other humanitarian activities, the United Nations conferred Special Consultative Status to MAM, with its Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), thus enabling collaboration with UN agencies. In December 2008, the UN’s Department of Public Information approved MAM as an associated nongovernmental organization to help its work of disseminating information and research into humanitarian issues.
Beginning with the 2001, the Mata Amritanandamayi Math has consistently dedicated volunteers and resources in response to disasters within India. Its most extensive disaster-relief program followed the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami. In response, MAM provided a value of $46 million in relief, including the construction of 6,200 tsunami-resistant houses in India and Sri Lanka, as well as 700 new fishing boats. It also constructed a multimillion-dollar bridge providing Alappad Panchayat, a tsunami-at-risk peninsula community, an evacuation route to the mainland. MAM has provided a combination of medical care, food, shelter, monetary aid and other forms of relief following the flooding of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh in 2009, Bihar in 2008, and Gujarat in 2005 and Bombay in 2005, as well as the Kashmir-Pakistan earthquake of 2005. It also reconstructed 1,200 homes following the 2001 Gujarat earthquake.
In connection with its sister organizations, such as the Mata Amritanandamayi Center in the United States, it also has responded to disasters outside India as well, including medical supplies, blankets and care for orphans following the 2010 Haiti earthquake, a donation of $1 million U.S. to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund, following Hurricane Katrina, and $1 million U.S. in relief aid to victims of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, with a focus on children orphaned in the disaster.
MAM’s Amrita SREE program was launched in 2006, with the goal of aiding 100,000 women through the development of 5,000 self-help groups. As of January 2011, there are more than 6,000 such groups, with more than 100,000 women participating throughout India. MAM has also set up an additional 1,000 self-help groups in Andaman Island. Through providing vocational education, start-up capital, marketing assistance and access to microcredit loans and microsavings accounts, the Amrita SREE program equips unemployed and economically vulnerable women with the skills and means to set up small-scale, cottage-industry businesses. As of January 2011, MAM has helped 3,500 groups to receive microcredit loans to expand their businesses, benefitting more than 60,000 families. In the aftermath of the 2004 Asian tsunami, India’s coastal communities found that the aquatic creatures —upon which they relied so heavily for sustenance—had been entirely disrupted. As with so many of their needs, hopes and sorrows, they brought this crisis to Amma. It was then that Amma, who recognized an urgent need for an alternate livelihood for every family in the tsunami-affected areas, launched the Ashram’s first community-based self-help programmes. It was Amma’s firm resolve that at least one member in each family engage in a profession that was not reliant upon increasingly unpredictable weather patterns. To that end, Mata Amritanandamayi Math (MAM) facilitated training in the following vocations:
Tailoring: MAM established nine tailoring schools and distributed 2,000 sewing machines—one to every program participant. Nursing: 450 women were provided free training in nursing assistance along with a stipend to study at AIMS (Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences—MAM’s super-specialty charitable hospital). Driving: 500 youths received free driving lessons and received driver’s licenses to facilitate employment as professional bus, truck and taxi drivers. Education: Seven eligible women received full scholarships to attend Amrita University Mysore’s School of Education and earned master’s degrees in Education. Handicrafts: 1,500 women trained in making coir (coconut fiber) and coir-based products and over 150 women trained in handloom weaving. Electronic Repair: 200 youths trained in niche trades including mobile phone and TV/VCR repair; plumbing; fashion design and handmade bag production.
On February 19, 2010, the President of India Pratibha Patil bestowed the Dharma Khadgam Award to MAM in recognition of its charitable activities. MAM’s president, Mata Amritanandamayi Devi, has received numerous awards for her role as the founder, inspiration and manager of MAM’s charitable activities.
