Srinagar Based NGO Serves Daily Essentials To People During Coronavirus Pandemic

New Delhi: During the coronavirus outbreak induced lockdown, with each passing day, 25-year-old student from Srinagar living with his mother, two sisters and a younger brother saw his family running out of basic essentials like wheat, salt, oil, and others. The family had no source of income as 25-year-old’s mother, the only breadwinner of the family, who used to run her house by teaching in a private school, was out of a job; the school was closed. While the family was trying to make ends meet, Serving Nations, a Srinagar based non-governmental organisation (NGO) came as a ray of hope.

Through social media, I got to know about the NGO Serving Nations providing Essential Eatable Family Kits (EEFK) to people during the coronavirus crisis. I contacted them and immediately the team provided us the EEFK consisting of essentials items including spices, oil, wheat, rice, said the 25-year-old student while speaking to NDTV.

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25-year-old’s family is one of the over 3,000 families Serving Nations has extended a helping hand to during the coronavirus pandemic. On March 11, NGO Serving Nations initiated its fight against COVID-19 by kick starting a campaign aimed at creating awareness about the coronavirus pandemic. With the crisis looming large, the NGO decided to step up its efforts and begin relief and rehabilitation work. Elaborating on the same, Mustafa Nazir, Founder and Chairman of Serving Nations, said,

We work in the field of education, women empowerment, health, social issues and others. Considering the current situation, we decided to start a relief programme in Srinagar, Anantnag, Pulwama, Budgam, Bandipora, and Baramulla.

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As part of the relief programme, any individual can reach out to the NGO and request for ration kit titled as Essential Eatable Family Kit (EEFK). The kit consists of eight basic items – rice (10 kg), wheat (5 kg), edible oil (1 litre), salt (1 kg), sugar (1 kg), red chilli powder (half kg), turmeric (half kg) and Nutri (half kg). The kit is expected to help a family for 15 days and once the ration is exhausted, the family can request for another kit.

Talking about how the team identifies beneficiaries and delivers EEFK, Yasmeena, District President, Anantnag at Serving Nations said,

Usually people contact us through social media and as and when we receive a request, our volunteers physically verify the applicant and then deliver the EEFK. Apart from this, we have a good number of active volunteers in various local areas and it is their responsibility to identify people.

While distributing the EEFK, the volunteers ensure they are clad in personal protective equipment (PPE) and practice social distancing.

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This way, as on May 31, the team has helped 3,486 families residing in six districts. Going forward, the plan is to cover over 4,000 families. Along with this, the NGO has distributed over 28,000 face masks, personal protective equipment (PPE) kits and other protective gear among health workers and other frontline workers. The NGO has conducted various fumigation and sensitisation activities in more than 90 villages.

The team plans to continue with its efforts including the distribution of protective gear and sanitisation activities. And start a helpline which will be connected with various concerned departments for quick and immediate responses to COVID-19 queries.

Signing off, Mr Nazir shared what motivated him and the team to contribute to society even during a lockdown and said,

It is our commitment to serve the people with our best efforts and especially when the entire world is blanketed by this threat. Also, seeing the needs of some families who could not even express their miseries motivated us to come forward and help.

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