A Cut Above

Meet these post-millenials bringing smiles to children who have lost their hair to ailments

- Ayushi Thapliyal

“I KNOW I CANNOT change a person or the choices they make. However, having the capacity to make a difference in the life of not one, but many, is something I aspire to,” says 19-year-old Amatullah Vahanwala. Evidently, she walks the talk. She and Niharika Jadeja started Hair for Happiness, a hair donation drive. The proceeds of the campaign go to the Little Princess Trust, a British non-profit that helps create wigs for children suffering from hair loss due to cancer treatments and other illnesses.

It all began in November 2015, when Amatullah and Niharika, class XI students of Bengaluru’s Candor International School, were discussing their community service project. Niharika told Amatullah about her first hair donation experience at the age of nine and that she was eager to do it again. “This set off a chain of brainstorming sessions, and we came up with the concept of Hair for Happiness,” says Amatullah, now a BBA student at the Centre of Management Studies, Bengaluru.