The Banyan, was founded in 1993 by Vandana and Vaishnavi, after their life–changing encounter with a young and homeless schizophrenic woman, who was about the same age as them. When it first started, The Banyan was a small, rented shelter for women with mental illness who had wandered from their homes and ended up on the streets of Chennai. Since then, The Banyan has grown to become a leader in the mental health sector. Today, The Banyan runs a psychiatric nursing home for 200 women, an urban mental health programme for 1000 people, a rural mental health programme for 3 lakh people and a long-stay rehabilitation centre for 60 women.

In 2010, Apeejay Trust joined 99 others in an initiative to pool together enough funds for The Banyan´s National Mental Health Coalition. This coalition includes clinicians, activists, user survivors and care givers, besides public health specialists and government representatives. This coalition will lead to an aggressive branding and marketing of mental health as an issue that needs attention. To us, funding their plans meant a speedier scaling-up of The Banyan model and helping address the issue that India faces in the realm of mental health.