Together Everyone Achieves More
Covid 19 Food Drive, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic completely upended the daily lives of everyone around the world. During the early days of the virus, it appeared as though India might escape the worst of it, but T.E.A.M. members realized that it was a question of when, not if, India would be severely impacted. A brainstorming session on how to help the local communities while personally staying safe from the virus resulted in the creation of a list of items that people could donate to daily wage earners in their communities, who were likely to be the most vulnerable when they could no longer earn a living.
These food kits consisted of food grains, pulses, oil, vitamin C, liquid soap, and root vegetables. Each T.E.A.M. member posted about this on Facebook, inspiring several other people across the city to do the same for their micro-communities. By the 23rd of March, over 700 daily wage earners had received food kits to take home for their families, which would provide them with a vital source of rations as the country was plunged into a 3 week lockdown.
Although T.E.A.M. volunteers were unable to leave their homes at all, essential services were still open and so there was still a way of doing something to help those most vulnerable to the virus and the resulting economic downturn. By raising funds online, T.E.A.M. was able to get involved with a local supermarket chain, and through the partnership was able to deliver food grain kits to 550 cancer patients and their families in spite of the logistical challenges associated with the strict stay-at-home order. After 9 days of tireless work, each of the cancer patients and their families, all of whom were extremely economically disadvantaged, had enough food to last for close to 2 months.
This project was done in collaboration with the Feed India Prasadam Project by Chef Vikas Khanna.
