City warms up for walkathon

Footsteps 4 good, a walkathon, is a fund-raising initiative by Jill Beckingham, wife of British deputy high commissioner in Mumbai, Peter Beckingham.

More than a 1,000 Mumbaiites are preparing to begin Gandhi Jayanti with a 10 km walk/run.

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Footsteps 4 good, a walkathon, is a fund-raising initiative by Jill Beckingham, wife of British deputy high commissioner in Mumbai, Peter Beckingham.

The purpose of the event is to raise funds for non-profit organisations (NGO) in Mumbai that have been registered through Give India, a fund-raising website that also scrutinises its NGOs for accountability.

"Gandhi worked for India's masses. We are trying to do the same by doing our bit for the society's underprivileged," said Jill.

The participants of the 10km walkathon are required to donate a minimum of Rs2,000 to any of the chosen 11 NGOs or to any other NGO of one's choice by prior registration.

Emulating the historic Dandi March by Mahatma Gandhi, Jill had led the 357km India-UK Friendship Walk last year from Ahmedabad to Dandi to raise money for charity. The walk took 17 days to complete.

"Like we did with the walk last year, drawing historic links this time was also important to reflect a deeper philosophy behind the walkathon of reaching out to as many sections of society as possible from tribal communities to leprosy-affected people. Also, the idea of including the run this time along with the walk was to make the event more competitive and include more people," added Jill.

"The strength of this event lies in the transparency that is followed in making sure that the money is going to the NGOs", says Mufaddal Dahodwala, owner of Integrated Conference and Event Management India, which is organising the event.