Food Distribution During Covid-19 Pandemic
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Year 2020 had been very challenging due to the pandemic. All the schools in the country were closed.
Vikramgadh – our catchment area – was quite isolated in the initial period. The precautions at the village level were good. Villagers believed more in isolation. They realized the havoc any such pandemic can cause to their lives – especially in area where medical facilities are limited and so are the financial resources with villagers. They did not allow outsiders to get in the village or informed the concerned authority. Hygiene was a challenge for them. They did not take the usage of masks seriously. Due to a freak incident, they got corona patient in the vicinity and the daily cases shot up. This overall developed a great level of scare in villagers. Everyone remained at home, but without any income, which otherwise is generated by male members going to other areas to work or go on fishing boats. While they have rice at home (from their own farm), they did not have money for other essential items for day to day livelihood.
In this background, we had to curtail our activities related to educational and medical support for some time. Since our senior member was stationed there, she decided to take another community initiative to help the villagers.
Suhrid foundation decided to help these villagers. We distributed the items in all the ten villages where we are associated with. Each family was delivered a pack, which comprised of (the composition of the kit varied in different distribution cycles):
- Potato – 2kg
- Onion – 2kg
- Chilly Powder – 250gm
- Turmeric – 250gm
- Sugar – 1kg
- Tea – 500gm
- Jaggery – 1kg
- Salt – 1kg
- Oil – 1 litre
- Soaps – bathing and washing
- Parle-G biscuit (4 packets each – sponsored by Parle directly)
These items were purchased in wholesale from market, packed at Mumbai and delivered to our clinic in Vikramgad. Our senior member, along with support from teachers from these schools, distributed these kits to villagers. Each kit was sufficient for 40-45 days. These distributions were carried two times in all 10 villages (and three times in 3 villages) during the period from May to Jul 2020. Each round of distribution had around 1500 kits.
We are thankful to all our donors who wholeheartedly reciprocated to our appeal on donation for this purpose sometime in May 2020 and also subsequently. We are also very thankful to management of Parle Products, for support to us and thousands of such NGOs during the pandemic – and last but not the least, the team of volunteers from villages, teachers from our schools and ever enthusiastic team of Shri Nayan bhai Shah who helped us do all these packaging and procuring of the materials.
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