Tendulkar responds to a CRYing need

Tendulkar is reported to have said that the cause was “something close to my heart” and proved it with a small but telling commercial on the very day he left the shores for the World Cup campaign, carrying the hopes of millions of Indians.

Mr Jose Mathew, General Marketing of VVF, said that it took more than a year for his team of designers to come up with perfect soap die to make the icons. The name of the sculptor, however, has been kept a secret as per the wishes of the artist.

CRY’s cause has the support of celebrities from all walks of life, among who are names like actor Jackie Shroff, ghazal king Jagjit Singh, classical music legends Pandit Jasraj and Zakir Hussain and artists like Anjali Ela Menon and Jehangir Sabavala. But Tendulkar is arguably the biggest mass-appeal celebrity to support the cause of CRY, a organisation started with Rs 50 and seven persons in 1979 by the late Rippon Kapur — an Air-India purser who died five years back. CRY now receives the support of one lakh individual contributors and 5000 organisations for the welfare of 300 charitable institutions and 700,000 children.

Pervin Verma, director of CRY, was understandbly elated. “Sachin has been very, very supportive. He may not remember, but he first supported our cause in 1993. I remember he did a small commercial right in the midst of a Ranji Trophy match in which he was the captain. We could not have asked for a more powerful medium.”