This Ganpati, if you are visiting Pooja and Dipesh Dedhia’s Mumbai home, they have one unusual request: skip the usual festive offerings and bring a notebook, pencils, colours or any fresh, unused stationery instead.
Once the celebrations are over, those offerings will travel much further than their home.
The couple hopes to turn them into stationery kits for around 400 students at an Adivasi Ashram Shala in Khadavali, giving each child fresh school supplies to use through the school year.
For Pooja and Dipesh, this is an extension of how they already celebrate Ganesh Chaturthi. Their Bappa is eco-friendly, the visarjan (immersion) happens at home, and the water from it, which contains seeds, is later used to nourish their plants.
Notebooks, pencils, colours and geometry boxes are being brought together to create complete stationery kits for the children to use through the school year.
This year, they want the celebration to reach beyond their home too, with stationery that can eventually find its way into a child’s schoolbag.
For 167 Sundays, they kept showing up
Pooja, a qualified chef and certified nutritionist, and Dipesh, a banker by profession, are the founders of Matoshreee Foundation.
For the couple, this initiative is not an isolated act of giving. Since July 2023, they have been serving freshly prepared breakfast to more than 100 people from underserved communities every Sunday.
What started as a small effort has now become a weekly commitment. They have completed 167 consecutive Sundays without missing a single one.
It is this belief that meaningful change comes from consistently showing up, and that also reflects and shapes their Ganpati celebrations.
From 40 children last year to a goal of 400
During Ganesh Chaturthi last year, Pooja and Dipesh decided to add another kind of offering to their celebrations.
They put together 40 stationery kits for children from an underserved community.
Inside were the kinds of things many of us may barely pause to think about while buying them: notebooks, pencil boxes, colours and other everyday school supplies.
But seeing how happy the children were to receive something of their own stayed with the couple.
This year, they decided to think much bigger.
The couple’s Ganpati celebrations extend beyond their Mumbai home, turning a festive offering into something a child can carry into the classroom.
Their goal is to put together stationery kits for around 400 students, with useful supplies such as notebooks, pencils, pens, colours, drawing books and geometry boxes.
Putting together 400 kits, however, is no small task. It means coordinating with vendors, discussing requirements, following up on supplies and ensuring that everything reaches the children.
For Pooja and Dipesh, though, every kit is worth that effort if it can make one child feel a little better equipped to learn.
You can help them – even without being in Mumbai!
On 14 and 15 September, when family and friends arrive at the Dedhias’ home for Ganpati darshan, the couple is asking them to come carrying stationery instead of the usual gifts.
They are accepting fresh, unused stationery until 20 September.
And you do not have to be in Mumbai to contribute.
Those living elsewhere in Maharashtra, in another part of India or even outside the country can get in touch with Pooja and Dipesh. The couple can share the stationery requirements and vendor details, allowing supporters to coordinate directly with the vendor and contribute towards one kit or several
Because an offering to Bappa does not have to remain at the altar.
It can become a new notebook in a child’s hands, colours waiting to fill a drawing book, or a geometry box packed into a schoolbag for the year ahead.
For Pooja and Dipesh, that is what celebrating Ganesh Chaturthi is ultimately about: welcoming Bappa into their home while carrying that spirit of giving beyond it.
Want to contribute?
Dipesh Dedhia — Founder, Matoshreee Foundation
📞 9892587975
Pooja Dipesh Dedhia — Co-founder, Matoshreee Foundation
📞 9930261913
Every contribution, whether it is a single stationery item, one complete kit or support for several children, can help make this celebration meaningful for a child too.
All images courtesy Pooja Dedhia
