Unsung heroes in lockdown: M'luru youths feed needy

Mangaluru: After the nationwide lockdown was announced in India amid the coronavirus pandemic poor people and migrant laborers are been suffering due to lack off food. However, the alarming situation has also brought to the fore countless stories of people who are serving the needy.

In such one noble initiative, Rakshith Salian Chilimbi along with his team members Rahul Pai, Joshua D’Souza, Chaitanya Raj, Ajith Kamath, Arun Pai, Hariprasad, Nitin Mada are distributing food and grocery to those who are really in need and can’t arrange their daily meals.

Speaking to Udayavani.com Rahul Pai said, “Soon after the lockdown was announced in the country our team decided to feed the needy people and all our members have happily contributed towards this cause. We visit a few major places in the city like State bank, Urwa, etc.. to distribute food. Our team members Rakshit Salian runs a hotel in the city and we prepare food in his hotel. The hotel staffs prepare food and our team members pack it and distribute it to around 200 people.”

“We distribute the food in the evening and feed over 200 people a day and if any person needs more food we give then extra food as well. The response for this initiative is really good and few friends from Chennai are helping us with funds. While distributing the food we make sure that everyone maintains social distancing,” Rahul added.

Similarly, members of Team ‘Cause’ led by Suhan Alva are also providing food, snacks to over 350 people a day including the police.

“Our team in the initial two days of lockdown used to distribute snacks and tea to people who were in need of it, but after days we decide to give rice items two times and snacks one time in a day. In the afternoon we distribute veg biryani which we get on discount from a hotel, in the evening we distribute snacks and in the night we give dal rice, which we prepare in one of our team member’s kitchen,” said Suhan.

He further added, “We have also collaborated with the district COVID control room and they inform us who many packages of food they need and we prepare accordingly.”

“We distribute food near Bunder and government school in Pandeshwar. We distribute snacks to police as well, they are really working hard to keep us all safe and it’s our responsibility to help the at least a little bit,” he said

“While distributing food we make sure people are sanitized and practice social distancing, therefore, we have only selected five volunteers to help us with this. Also, we are fortunate enough to have social worker Ganesh Naik to help us in this good cause,” said Suhan.