Javed Akhtar, Shankar Mahadevan Team Up For Akshay Patra

Renowned lyricist Javed Akhtar and singer/composer Shankar Mahadevan will release a song this August celebrating the joys of childhood for a charitable cause.

Houston: Renowned lyricist Javed Akhtar and singer/composer Shankar Mahadevan will release a song this August celebrating the joys of childhood enabling award winning non-governmental organisation Akshaya Patra, to raise awareness about its programme to enable hunger free education. The lyrics for this special song will be composed by Javed Akthar and sung by noted singer and composer Shankar Mahadevan. The music, accompanied by a video featuring Mahadevan, will launch in the month of August when Akshaya Patra will be serving their billionth meal.

According to Shankar the music will be poetic and will have a melody that lingers. "I am very happy to be associated with Akshaya Patra, as the cause is very close to my heart and something that I have always wanted to do ? feed children," said Mahadevan in a release. With this partnership, Mahadevan joins the league of socially conscious celebrities by becoming brand ambassador for the Akshaya Patra Foundation. The foundation runs one of the world`s largest mid-day school feeding programmes, in partnership with the federal and participating state governments of India, serving over 1.3 million children daily, in over 9,000 schools in 10 states. "Akshaya Patra combines good management, innovative technology and smart engineering to deliver school lunch at a fraction of the cost of similar programs in other parts of the world," said a spokesperson. It costs Akshaya Patra only USD 15 to feed a child for an entire year. Madhu Sridhar, president and CEO of Akshaya Patra US, commented, "Javed Akhtar and Shankar Mahadevan teaming up will be a powerful message with a powerful voice to ensure hunger is not a barrier to education for these deserving children." PTI