India and Punjab Kings left-handed opener Shikhar Dhawan is incredibly pleased with his efforts in preparation of IPL 2022 resulting in favourable results, including becoming just the second batter after Virat Kohli to amass 6,000 runs in the history of the tournament. In the ongoing season, Dhawan has scored 381 runs in eleven matches at an average of 42.33 and strike-rate of 122.11, including three half-centuries. "I am happy that the efforts I put in the process of preparing for the season is paying off and feels good to have crossed the milestone of 6,000 runs in IPL across editions. But to me, the main priority always has been team performance and the focus is to ensure that we as a team live upto the expectations of the fans of Punjab Kings spread across the world, as they have showered us with lots of love & support," said Dhawan in a statement. Recently, Dhawan's newly-launched philanthropic initiative 'Shikhar Dhawan Foundation' organised its biggest on-ground educational event titled 'Youngistaan' on May 8 and 9. The aim of the two-day event undertaken by the foundation was to fulfil basic requirements of education supplies for underprivileged students and to provide them with zeal as well as enthusiasm towards learning, so that no child is held back from achieving greater heights.
Dhawan's foundation aims to provide underprivileged children with access to the path of learning and sports through 10 partnering organisations to impact the lives of 2100-plus children from underprivileged backgrounds through multiple distribution of educational supplies, art and craft items, classroom materials, sports supplies and various other needs of special kids. Under its Youngistaan campaign, meritorious players in various sports like Taekwondo, Cricket, Tennis, Basketball, etc are being helped and sponsored apart from para-athletes. Dhawan's foundation will further cover expenses towards equipment, training, academy fees and other logistics. "My passion is to create a deeper and sustainable impact in people's lives. We act as an enabler by building the capacities of the NGOs and civil society organisations," said Dhawan. Currently at seventh place on the points table, Punjab are on 10 points from 11 matches and need to win the remaining three matches in the league stage to have a chance at qualifying for the playoffs. Their next match will be against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Friday at Brabourne Stadium.