About Us

History of Upcountry people in Sri Lanka

1792

During the French Revolutionary Wars between 1792-1801, the British East India Company conquered Sri Lanka. When France took over the Netherlands, The British began to advance into Sri Lanka from India. The British chose to make their occupation of the Island permanent.

1815

The British took over the kingdom with the assistance of local Kandyan leaders. The British assured Kandyans of their rights and privileges, as well as the preservation of customary laws, institutions, and religion. The Kandyan provinces were merged with the rest of the kingdom when it was defeated.

1823

In 1823, British emperors brought people of Indian origin to work in the plantation sector in Sri Lanka to overcome poverty. These individuals are now known as “Hill Country Tamils” and they work as daily wage laborers in the estate sector. For the past two centuries, these hands with tea stains have been bound by poverty. These underprivileged individuals live in compact line houses with roughly a space of only eight-by-eight feet. They lack adequate social, economic, and health development as well as proper education. Our goal is to uplift and develop this community.

1830

From 1830- the mid 19th century, coffee production drove ceylon’s economic progress.

1840

Due to a labor shortage on the plantations, huge numbers of indentured workers arrived from Southern India in the 1840s. The group of Tamil Indians fled from India to Sri Lanka to liberate themselves from feudalism, caste oppression, famine, hunger, and poverty.

1840s

They were enslaved to meet their needs to yield coffee, and lentils. They were victimized and left without food, without clothes, without shelter, beaten and kicked as slaves to build bridges and railways by the British.

1870s

A leaf disease destroyed the coffee industry.

1880s

Experiments with tea as a plantation crop were initially successful, and tea expanded over the hill country's higher and lower slopes. Rubber and coconuts were also plantation crops during this period.

1947

Shortly after gaining dominion status, Ceylon conducted elections for the parliament specified in its new constitution. The UNP was led by english-educated colonial leaders who were familiar with the British-style parliamentary democracy that had been created on the island.

2022 - 2023

makes it the 200th year where the plantation workers are still working endlessly in the fields. Having to make their quota of picking 20KG of tea leaves to make their daily wage of about $2 USD a day.

How children are reaching their full potential…

Our Vision

We connect everyone around the world in the fight to end poverty where the children can reach their full potential towards their future endeavors. Giving them a beautiful childhood as every child deserves.

Our Mission

Our objective is to provide every child with proper nutrition, health care, education and assuring they are raised in a loving and secure home.

Values

Selfless service
Integrity
Personal courage
Respect
Diversity

Who We Are?

World Action Foundation is a non-profit social service organization that provides educational support, nutrition, and healthcare to enhance the quality of life of disadvantaged children and their families. We are committed to ensuring our support is effective, and strictly adhere to regulations and relevant policies to uphold this commitment.

The Constitution of World action Foundation provides the overarching governance structure that enables us to achieve our mission in a way that is consistent with our vision, values and strategy. Focusing on education, health/nutrition, and financial empowerment are the main pillars to a sustainable community. Creating opportunities for the youth of often overlooked communities, by providing long-term guidance in education and child protection. This statement outlines our commitment to safeguarding children and young people from abuse and neglect as we work with their families and communities.

What Do We Do?

We help the children in need, providing healthcare, nutrition, educational support and guidance. In doing so, we provide sustainability and opportunity for growth and success in life. With our round the clock staff, we respond to major problems and emergencies with innovative development programs and donation schemes which correlate to the current situations of the world.

Why We Are Special?

As an organization striving to inspire people and to assist deprived children, we have assigned our teams to different categories. We have a unique team going to the field to identify targeted groups and address the needs of underprivileged communities. This group gathers specific data through interviews and observations to design our projects. Then with the help of international donors and sponsors, we are able to change the lives of every person in need. Becoming a sponsor is the turning point in a child’s life and through World Action Foundation, you are given the opportunity to personally connect with the child you sponsor and get continuous updates on their progress and milestones.

Message from the Founder

Subash Sundarraj served in the dual role of CEO and director at a successful trading academy, Krifx LTD. in Toronto for 20+ years. Subash brings 30+ years of experience in leadership, management, and revenue generation roles including CEO, teacher, and founder of various successful ventures. His persistence and commitment has demonstrated his ability to transform a startup organization into generating consistent revenue. Passionate for change in the tea plantation community, he has funded the start-up of World Action Foundation to create permanent changes in the most vulnerable communities. With his first target being Up Country, Sri Lanka, he envisions expanding worldwide and eliminating child labour, as well as many other target groups, and creating a new generation of educated professionals. He demonstrates his willpower through all his successful projects through Lanka Vision Action Foundation, feeding over 100,000 meals to the most vulnerable in Sri Lanka within 6 months of their launch. In July 2022, for his service, he received the second-highest national honour of Sri Lanka award ‘Lankaputhra Deshakeerthi Deshamanya’ by the government of Sri Lanka as a civil honour.

Subash Sundarraj

Founder

Board Of Directors

Priyanka Sundarraj has a vast range of experience in marketing, social media, strategy, and charitable event management. Being involved with various organizations has contributed to building a great network, and provided outlets to get involved with the community for various causes. In 2022, she spent half a year in Sri Lanka, volunteering her time for Lanka Vision Action Foundation to assist with media, project design, and management. Her creativity and innovative skills is definitive through her custom-designed projects to better articulate their causes and express their vision through social media and branding. She has organically grown business pages to 50,000+ organic followers with over 1 million views. She has assisted numerous companies in Fort Lauderdale, US as a volunteer, transforming and marketing their businesses to become successful. Followed by management and market strategizing for various companies of Toronto. She has also been involved in various charitable events since 2012 and has gained a wide range of experience in event management and organization. She has participated in events including breakfast programs with churches for the homeless, the breast cancer foundation gala, relay races for spinal cord injury, a cn tower climb for charity, and many other events.

Priyanka Sundarraj

Courtney specializes in working with children, youth as well as children, and youths with special needs. She works as an early childhood educator in a preschool room and is also a mother. She has always loved being around children, even while growing up as the eldest sibling to 3 younger brothers. She is passionate about helping others and prioritizes this commitment to her community. Her goal in life is to further involve herself in experiences that can allow her to contribute to the community while expanding her skills. Her commitment and compassion towards the children enlighting a sympathetic outlook on the targets of our projects, to create the best quality of outcome for the communities we are improving.

Courtney Silva

Kenya is a 28 year old advocate who currently works in law enforcement after completing her degrees in visual arts and criminology. In her community, she is known for always lending a helping hand, and giving back to her community. Growing up, Kenya volunteered in an organization known as ‘Born Leads Empowering Youth Positively’ from the beginning to its end. This allowed her to further develop her skills, and continuously grow, while becoming more involved with her community. This has guided her onto a path and paved the way for her to be able to utilize the knowledge she gained, and give back. She is looking forward to scaling her impact on her community with World Action Foundation.

Kenya Pinnock

Kathi Harder is passionate about helping people and underprivileged communities. Her passion for people and the environment led to her entrepreneurial venture starting her company Simone Products, distributing eco-friendly pet products in Canada, and found success with a best-selling product on Amazon. She is dedicated in creating and distributing unique problem solving products that are safe for people and the environment, and is the heart of her future goals with her entrepreneurial journey. She loves to learn about new cultures and connect with people which brings her a deeper and meaningful perspective on life, and how she can contribute more to the multicultural community. She hopes her dynamic skills in leadership, creativity, business management, communication, marketing, social media, content creation will be a great attribute in helping communities through Lanka Vision Foundation.

Kathi Harder

Inthuja Indrakumar is recognized as well-rounded, and knowledgeable in many areas of experience that are relevant to a successful organization. Her proficiency in the finance department, and business management, aids in improving business strategies to help grow organizations. Inthuja has led or assisted executives and boards with the enhancement of internal controls associated with financial, information technology, regulatory activities, operational activities, and functional areas. As well as serving multiple roles in construction software, and the dental business. She is keen on being part of positive changes in the world.

Inthuja Indrakumar

Ganashing, superintendent at Bialik Hebrew Day School. Ganashing is passionate and in love with his job. He has always felt quite content and inspired by the progress and growth of these gifted children over the years at Bialik Hebrew Day School. When he witnessed the unjust circumstances of children in these marginalized communities, he couldn’t bare to see the standards of their living conditions. Ganashing’s goal is to create equality around the globe and make sure all children have access to these basic necessities like nutrition, education, and secure homes. He says that ‘a child is a child and should all have the same opportunity, no matter where they are.’

Ganashing Arunachalam

Karunasegaran Selliah is a thriving business man who was born in Sri Lanka. When immigrating to Canada, he seeked employment and acquired a job working in a blinds factory. Karunasegaran was adamant on improving his skills, and gaining more experience to lead to other opportunities. He then started expanding into the jewelry industry, gaining business skills. After 30 years of living in Canada, he now owns a jewelry shop in both Sri Lanka and Canada. Majority of Karunasegaran’s relatives live back home in Sri Lanka. He was raised in a very rural environment, and he witnessed a lot of labour injustice during his time in Sri Lanka. This fuels his will and need to help make a change in these underprivileged peoples’ lives. Karunasegaran joined World Action Foundation to achieve his goal and wishes to dedicate the rest of his life to improving the underprivileged communities in his home town and across the globe.

Karunasegaran Selliah

A hard-working individual who has a vast array of experiences in numerous industries since the age of 16. Pierre left France at the age of 20 years old, starting from cleaning services and working his way into diverse bilingual call centers. By the age of 30, he started his own company with 2 of his colleagues called Nogimik. He enjoyed his ability to help others gain skills and improve through boot camps, personal training, and even producing music. More recently expanding into the automotive industry; Nogimik Towing. With his drive to help individuals with their personal achievements and self-growth, Pierre is full-heartedly ready to translate these skills into better improving, monitoring and evaluating the progress of every child, and every adult that we help.

Pierre Coriat

Shehan is a business professional with 10+ years of progressive experience. His experience includes operations analysis, supporting operational improvements and business strategies that positively impact quality assured client centric service levels while preserving business continuity. Shehan is recognized for his ability to cultivate and nurture solid relationships and alliances by employing strong, direct communication and leadership skills. Shehan has earned a reputation for his ability to orchestrate multiple multifaceted complex projects and align resources to drive projects from conception to completion within the mandated time-frame. He wishes to bring his expertise to World Action Foundation and to assure success and reality of all upcoming complex projects.

Shehan Yoganathan

Santosh Sidha is a notable contributor to society. He has always been involved with the improvement and betterment of the lives of those in need. Being a leader at the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) India, has changed the lives of so many. Santosh has years of experience in generating revenue, and developing donor relationships. He creatively designs innovative fundraising campaigns, to help achieve World Action Foundation’s ambitious growth mandate. Santosh’s passion for giving back has allowed him to develop strong organizational, and donor relationships. This has led to successful programs, and most importantly, improving the health of children, elders, and those with disabilities. As well as creating more educated children, and youth, while reducing poverty.