“The world’s most spoken negative word today is Corona positive. The sudden but inevitable lockdown has shattered the lives of many, especially the migrant workers whose livelihood is based on the daily wages they earn. When the lockdown was announced the first thought that came to my mind was about the food delivery services like Swiggy, Zomato etc. I thought it would be tough to survive without these services, especially for bachelors like me. I saved up some amount for an apartment down payment and was also waiting to get some funds that were due. Pooling it all together, I thought I could invest on a decent one and also buy a new car. The whole idea changed when I had to step out of the house one day during the lockdown. Some of the migrant workers in our area knocked on my car window asking for food. A small contribution from my end must have helped them to survive that day, but the same repeated the next day and in areas near by. I took the help of my neighbour and we cooked food for some people and served them. But feeding a couple of people for a day or two wouldn’t be enough and that’s when I took the next step forward. The apartment and car can wait, and if everything goes well, I can save again and invest. For the time being, I pooled up all my savings and started serving cooked food to the needy. We later realized that some people had kitchens and cooked food wasn’t the need for them. They needed essentials. People who were homeless needed cooked food. So we categorized the needs and realized we needed a bigger team. I spoke to my childhood friends and formed a team of seven. They were kind enough to contribute funds as well as give their time to this cause.
I took charge of raising funds, procurement and distribution, identifying the needy, collaborated with BBMP and the city police department.
Our day started at 3 a.m. with buying vegetables from markets that were at least 30 km away. We had to bring them to the cooking team by 6 a.m so that the food can be delivered to the needy by 8.30 a.m. We kept a log of all help requests and sorted them by location and dispersed teams to distribute the food and essentials.
This cycle continued and we reached a point where our funds depleted but the help requests increased. We decided to ask other friends, strangers, seek social media support, etc. The response was overwhelming.
In a single day we were able to pool funds of more than 1 lakh rupees. We saw kind souls who passed on the information to others. A twitter friend who had helped us passed on the information to his brother-in-law and the man was kind enough to send us rice bags. Vegetable sellers at Srinivasapuram market offered to help by giving us vegetables worth Rs. 5,000 free of cost for a day. There wasn’t a single person that turned down our request for help. The city police department was equally supportive. When there was no inter-state transportation during the lockdown, they stepped forward and let us bring in the supplies. The local Ayyapa Swamy temple came forward to help as well. This gave us a lot of hope and the efforts and the kindness of people snowballed and by the time we were winding up, the impact we made was huge. We were able to provide ration to 16,080 families four times in a month, i.e. eight times in two months.
We were able to feed 7,000 individuals approximately. In the whole process we distributed 3,000 sanitizers and 5,000 pairs of gloves to BBMP workers, sanitary workers, police, and health care professionals, 100 PPE kits to Hindupur Government Hospital and other areas, and 5,000 masks in Chittoor. The entire effort gave us a lot of satisfaction and an opportunity to introspect on what was happening around us and how Covid has impacted lives of many.
It was a moment of pride to be invited by Bengaluru City Commissioner to visit him at his office and receive a letter of appreciation from them. Apart from the government, it is everyone’s responsibility to use their time and resources to make sure vulnerable populations are cared for during the pandemic.
If there is any regret, it is the regret of not being able to help more, reach out to many more that needed this support. While we have begun to reopen, the outbreak has continued to strain resources, shuttering businesses and leaving many without jobs. My request to the people on this occasion of Independence Day is to look around for each other and give as much as they can. After all, until the last human is alive, no one is an orphan!”
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