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For a group of walkers in Anna University, Saturday morning was no less than a page out of a movie script.

Around 6.30 a.m., they saw a woman and a young girl asking people for directions. Curious, some of them approached the duo to offer help.

R. Swathi, who had scored 1,017 marks in her Plus Two, came with her mother Thangaponnu, a shepherd from their hometown of Musiri in Tiruchi. “They were asked to come to Anna Arangam, Tamil Nadu Agriculture University, Coimbatore, but they reached Anna University by mistake,” said M. Saravanan, a former student of College of Engineering, Guindy and a member of a walking group called Twalkers.

Counselling was to start at 8.30 a.m. in Coimbatore. Both mother and daughter had lost hope. One of the walkers brought them breakfast, another went to book and print out the flight tickets, while another was speaking to TNAU staff in Coimbatore. Tickets were confirmed and Twalkers’ members decided to share the cost of Rs. 10,500. Some of the walkers, who are teaching at Anna University, spoke to TNAU registrar C.R. Ananda Kumar, explained the problem and asked for extra time.

“We took off at 10.05 a.m., landed at 11.28 a.m. and in the next hour we had the admission letter on our hands,” Ms. Swathi said. She will now pursue B.Tech. Biotechnology at the Coimbatore campus. “It looks like a miracle now,” she says. The Twalkers did not stop there. They called up Thangaponnu to confirm if they had secured the admission. “It was very kind of them to do so. They came around like an angel when we had lost hope,” Swathi said.

After getting the seat and back in their hometown in Musiri, the mother-daughter are now planning to visit Chennai again. “We want to return the money they spent to buy our flight tickets. How else can we say thank them,” Ms. Thangaponnu said.