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Covid-19 challenges: Feeding the needy, fighting hunger in crisis
As citizens across the nation come together to fight the coronavirus pandemic, some Delhi-based NGOs have been working around the clock to feed the needy.
At the time of crisis, it’s the good Samaritans who come to the forefront and work tirelessly for the sake of the needy. One such angel in disguise is the NGO Humanitarian Aid International (HAI, founded by Sudhanshu Singh, which has been serving cooked food — including 2,500 food packets daily to the underprivileged migrant workers — in locations such as Uttam Nagar, Dwarka, central Delhi and Mundka.
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Sudhanshu, who has earlier worked with international NGOs that respond to disasters, says, “Dealing with disasters isn’t new to us. I founded this organisation in 2016, and I have dealt with so many disasters. But we are in an unusual disaster now, which none of us has experienced before. This time it’s so difficult because people can’t come out and most of the things one has to do alone, including loading and unloading stuff. As humanitarian workers, we have to be prepared to deal with uncertainties. One has to be innovative and come up with strategies to reach out to people. So, we not only served cooked food and provided dry ration, we also started conducting online health care programme, gave sanitation support, and even helped sanitation workers. I feel local organisations should be helped in this endeavour, as they can do a whole lot of work.”
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The food drive in charge at HAI, Sudhir, is a Delhi-based mechanical engineer. He says, “Ever since corona struck, it became our first duty to act on providing food to those in need. We are not very rich in terms of sources, and depend on the contribution through social media. On March 26, we set up our first kitchen and distributed over 1,000 food packets, and by the second day, we had three kitchens running, and we were distributing about 2,500 packets. For this, we sought help of Delhi Police in identifying the people who needed our help the most, so that the food goes to those who genuinely needed it.”
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The NGO specialises in disaster management, and has previously worked in rehabilitation work after the Assam floods, Kerala floods, and village fire in Uttarakhand. But, the biggest challenge this time round has been to address incessant distress calls on social media, and feed as many as possible. Sudhir adds, “People have called up to say ‘There are 5 labours stuck, we need food here’. We understood that 1,000 packets won’t solve any purpose. Even acquiring atta, dal and chawal was a problem initially. So, we decided not to complicate things with extensive food containers and started serving rice pulao with soya bean. We wanted to feed more number of people with limited resources. And from wherever we got distress calls, I sent them to the grocery store, spoke to the owner, and transferred the money via Paytm (e-wallet). ”
Along the way, Sudhir has been helped by many passionate volunteers who wanted to make a difference in these testing times. He adds, “It’s encouraging to see people contributing via money and even setting up kitchens themselves. We have been working 16 hours a day, and distributing food. Apart from this, we have also successfully distributed dry ration to over 500 families, which includes 40 kg atta, 10kg dal, 4ltr oil, and salt and spices. Although funds have seen a downward trend, but we are hopeful that more contributions will come in.”
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