We regret to announce the recent death of Ray Bissill and extend our condolences to his family. Ray had visited Satkaarya and our children in Chennai and has proved, with his family, a stalwart supporter of our work for many years. We were stunned, delighted and a little overwhelmed to learn that Ray has bequeathed £50,000 to Batemans.

This follows on from a donation from the estate of Mary Stark. Mary left some of her estate to her good neighbour and regular Batemans supporter, Chris Glover. He used the unexpected legacy to make a generous donation of £25,000 to Batemans.

The Batemans catering stall was once more on the frontline in July at Steventon’s Truck festival, described as the Godfather of the small music festival.

It certainly proved a godfather to Batemans, delivering a profit of more than £10,500, the largest amount we have ever raised from the event.

Dozens of people worked shifts over four days to run the Batemans stall – a fantastic effort led by trustees Alex Jacob and Marion Mills.

Here’s Alex’s catchy summary of everyone’s efforts.

In July ten people enjoyed a stroll along the Brightlingsea waterfront in Essex to visit the Batemans Tower.  Although the tower’s name has nothing to do with our charity, supporter Anne Fitzgerald decided it was a perfect excuse for a little fundraiser, providing a slap-up afternoon tea in her garden afterwards and raising a fantastic £200.

In May, a very successful plant and cake sale in Essex raised nearly £1,500, shared between the local church Ukrainian support group, MSUK and Batemans. Another similar event is being held on the morning of Saturday August 20 at St John’s Church in Chelmsford. It is being advertised as an opportunity to fill gaps left by plants defeated by the hot weather and scorching sunrays.

A curry night is being scheduled in Cambridge for later this year, and a quiz night in Chelmsford on November 12… we’ll keep you posted!

We are delighted that, despite pandemic restrictions, and thanks to your support, we remain financially stable.

With the easing of restrictions, some of our regular fundraising events are returning, with the first of 2022 being a clothes swapping event in Cambridge in February – organised by trustee Amanda Morris-Drake – which raised several hundred pounds. If you’d like advice on holding a fundraising event for Batemans do get in touch.

Looking further ahead, the Batemans catering stall is booked for its traditional outing at the Truck Festival in Oxfordshire in July. The picture above shows two of our supporters doing their thing at the event back in 2014!

Madeline Peters organised various amazing fundraisers in 2021, from baking cakes, selling flowers and bunting, to running a half-marathon. Her fantastic, and continuing efforts, have raised more than £1,000 towards Batemans’ Grand 100 total.

Meanwhile, to mark her 80^th birthday, long-term supporter Helen Fletcher has also raised more than £1,000 for Batemans. Unfortunately, like so many, she had to self- isolate for a while. But the great news is that, during her isolation, Helen used her creative skills to design and print greeting cards to sell for Batemans, adding to her fundraising total.

Thanks to the hard work of our team in Chennai, Christmas, New Year and the celebration of Pongal was as busy a time for our youngsters as ever.

The children were treated to a special dinner out by local sponsors on Christmas Day. They then celebrated Pongal having fun and games at our lovely Sendrambakkam land site, which will be home to our new school.

While building work on our school site at Sendrambakkam has not started due to the pandemic, it provides a lovely spacious, open and private ground out of the city for the children to enjoy and they travelled there for the day to celebrate Pongal.

As well as the children being given sets of new clothes and undergarments by local supporters, one of our long-term trustees and supporter, Natasha Conlon – with the help of her friend Mrs Sunith – organised a ceramic Christmas ornaments painting and decorating workshop especially for our children.

A table-tennis set has been donated so the children can now enjoy some ping-pong too.

The picture shows a tug of war taking place in the grounds of our Sendrambakkam site, during a day of games and festivities to mark Pongal.

See all the latest news from Batemans in our annual newsletter, published in November 2021.