Karuna Stories From The Ground
Project Delhi is a 100% volunteer run collective borne during Covid times to serve people with disabilities with Grocery & medicine in the NCR region. Few of our volunteers have penned their thoughts & reflections on stories of service & publishing 4 of it for all of us to enjoy
#1.) The Citizen’s Chemist by Shyam Gupta
I have voluntarily taken the service of delivering medicines to the needy across NCR & have been doing this for more than a month now. Few days back,I got a call from a woman & I told her to go to the chemist & give me a call. She said that she would give a missed call as she doesn’t have balance. I immediately did a RS 50 recharge so that she could call me back. On another instance, a chemist was refusing to give medicine to an individual because the prescription had got expired. I told the individual to get a new prescription to which he started crying & saying,” I want food”. I told him to go to the nearest grocery shop to which he remarked, “main kitna ka saamaan Lu”. I told him, “Just listen to your heart & take whatever is necessary. The cost is not a constraint as long as you are really taking essentials”. He got moved & bought goods worth RS 900. There was a man who could afford to pay but was unable to find a chemist shop. I connected him with a shop & he blessed me so much. I love talking to people & serving them. I am doing a course on Gandhiji & in one of the lectures it’s prescribed to have no ego while serving otherwise inner transformation gets lost out. The medicine requests which come to me are of small denominations of less than RS 200 & hum log bahut thoda SA hi to Kar rahe Hain. I am in gratitude to these 300 individuals whom I have supplied medicines for sharing their stories & beautiful family of chemist shops who respond my number in the first beep.
#2.) The Chosen One by Aditya Sen
On Wednesday 29th April 2020, I was on my routine call and ensuring deliveries on ground. It is usually difficult to cater to an urgent request due to the logistical constraints and we had taken a call to fulfil them locally. I received a call from a far-flung area close to the border of Delhi and Haryana. The lady called for some groceries request as they had no economical means to buy it themselves. I happily took the details down and assured her that she will receive her groceries in 3 days. I called my colleague Rahul and shared the details with him. We decided that we should get it fulfilled locally as it is quite far and might take us longer than expected. Rahul initiated the process of local procurement and called the lady.
At around 3:00 pm, Rahul informed me that the couple has a month old baby and needs Lactogen for her. Without much deliberation, we decided we should cater to the request and hence asked her to visit the nearest chemist to procure the same. Rahul, over his discussion with the lady, was informed that the baby wasn’t well. He called me post the request for our usual catching up. While we were discussing the unfolding of events, he mentioned that the child wasn’t well and was under some medications prescribed by the local chemist. We expressed our concern and that was the end of our discussion about the child.
I usually go through the logs for the day at 9:00 pm every night. While I was browsing through the logs, I was reminded of my conversation with Rahul. Instincts kicked in and I called the lady. She picked up the call, I enquired about the health of the child, during this enquiry I took note of the situation in detail. The baby had symptoms of dysentery from the past 3 days. There were no signs of improvement even after the medicines. I offered to arrange for an ambulance so that the child can be taken to a hospital. The mother hesitated being a woman and traveling alone in the night. Also, the child was sleeping for the last two hours. I understood the situation and said, “It is fine for now, please let me know if you would like to take her to hospital tomorrow morning, I will make sure that there is an ambulance to take you there”. She agreed to this proposal and said she will call me in the morning.
After disconnecting the call, I started preparing for dinner. While in the kitchen, I called up a friend who works with the Delhi Commission for Protection of Children Rights (DCPCR). I told her about the situation and she immediately shared the ambulance operator contact. It was almost 11:00 pm in the night, I was hungry and started setting up the table.
My phone flashed, I received the call, a scared voice in distress on the other side said “Sir, Baachi ke mooh se phen aaraha hai”. I realised it was the same lady I spoke a couple of hours back. I calmed her down, asked her to allow enough space for the baby to breathe and gather all the medical documents. I had no time to think, just started making calls for an ambulance. My dinner table lay set in front of my eyes, my eyes glued to the phone, my mind thinking about the child. I was able to reach the ambulance operator, called him and told him the emergency. He was unwilling to make a trip to that area in the night and said that all the vehicles are on duty. With a little persuasion and persistence I was able to convince him to act. While that coordination was happening, I called up my friend from DCPCR, asked her to get me a list of hospitals with functional Emergency outpatient services for children. She sent me the list within a few minutes and I immediately started to map the closest hospital around the area. I had lost track of time by then, I called up the lady, informed her that an ambulance was on its way.
As I finished the mapping, the ambulance had already arrived, I spoke to the driver and after a brief discussion, and we were convinced that Safdarjung hospital was our best bet. They were on their way, my food was cold on the table, my mind feeling some solace. I looked at the time on my phone, it was 11:20 pm. That is the longest 20 minutes. They reached Safdarjung Hospital by 11:50, the child was immediately admitted and I was assured that the situation is under control. I went to the kitchen, warmed my food and finally could eat. I couldn’t sleep until 4:00 am, and called the lady again to check on the child’s health. She seemed composed and that was really assuring. The child was under supervision. Our conversation continued, she told me the condition of their family and that she was not the biological mother of the child and had adopted her on the 28th April 2020. Her Husband was a wheelchair user & was relieved on passing of the crisis. Later we also arranged a drop for her from the hospital to the house.
I was aware that parenting is an act of selflessness, that night I realised the power of being selfless. I am compelled to believe that these roles were chosen for the night. Everyone was one thing in common, selflessness! And yes, did I do anything extraordinary here? Anyone in my role would have done the same thing & for that night I consider myself blessed because I I was the chosen one.
#3.) दूध का पैकेट by Rahul Srivastav
जब मेरे Project Delhi के साथी आदित्य से मुझे मीना जी के बारे में पता चला तो मैंने उन्हें संपर्क करने की कोशिश की. मीना जी अपने परिवार के साथ ( उनके पति और दो बच्चे ) दिल्ली के नांगलोई इलाक़े में रहती है, मीना जी “लम्बर माईलोमिनगोसेल पैरापेलेजिया “ नाम की एक बीमारी की शिकार है जिसकी वजह से वो चल नहीं सकती और व्हिल चेयर पर अपना काम करती हैं । Project Delhi में हम ऐसे लोगों की यथासंभव मदद करने की कोशिश कर रहे हैं जो किसी भी क़िस्म की विकलांगता के चलते , कोविद 19 के लॉक डाउन में रोज़मर्राह की ज़रूरतें ( खाना और दवाई ) को लेकर परेशानी का सामना कर रहे हैं ।
जब मैंने मीना जी से बात की तो उन्होंने मुझे बताया कि उन्हें अपनी दो साल की बच्ची रूपाली के लिये दूध की परेशानी हो रही है । आम तौर पे हम Project Delhi में विकलांगों की सहायता के लिये सूखा राशन मुहैया कराते हैं । जब हमने मीना जी से सूखा दूध पाउडर लेने की गुज़ारिश की तो उन्होंने बताया की कच्चे दूध का पैकेट उन्हें और रूपाली को ज़्यादा राहत पहुँचायेगा । Project Delhi में हम जो भी वितरण करते हैं उसका रसीद लेते हैं ताकि उसका ऑडिट किया जा सके मगर मीना जी के घर के पास की डेयरी पर उपयुक्त रसीद नहीं थी और हम नहीं चाहते थे कि मीना जी के दूध के लिये बहुत दूर जाना पड़े । एक और समस्या ये भी थी कि दूध हररोज चाहिए था और हम सिमित संसाधनो के चलते हर रोज़ मीना जी के पास नहीं जा सकते थे ।
हमने आपस में बात करके ये निर्णय लिया कि हम मीना जी की मदद करने के लिये अपने तरीक़ों को थोड़ा बदलेंगे और फिर हमने मीना जी के घर के नज़दीक वाली डेयरी से सम्पर्क किया और उन्हें आगे के कुछ दिनों की दूध सप्लाई के लिये पैसे दिये गये । मीना जी को ये पता था हमें डेयरी से उपयुक्त रसीद नहीं मिल पायेगी और इसीलिए उन्होंने अपनी तरफ़ से मुझसे कहा कि वो हर रोज़ जब भी दूध का पैकेट लेंगी,हमें उसकी फ़ोटो भेज देगीं । हमारे मना करने पर भी वो मानी नहीं और अब हर सुबह मुझे अपने मैसेज बाक्स में सुबह लिया हुआ दूध का पैकेट मिलता है । आपसी प्रेम और सहयोग से बड़ी कोई रसीद नहीं… मीना जी के जज़्बे हिम्मत और प्रतिबद्धता को Project Delhi का सलाम!
#4.) Volunteering Outdoors by Aditi Muranjan
My parents don’t know yet that I ventured outside to deliver food kits to people with disabilities but it was the need of the hour. We had artilleries of masks, gloves & sanitisers along with our ammunitions of food packets ready to be distributed across the lanes of Delhi. Our captain Milapji said,” ye kitna aacha soch hain ki hum dusro ke liye kuch kar rahe hain” & zoomed his car to his destination. I was scared a bit because we were travelling to the Interiors of east & west Delhi where GPS also gets lost. Once the Police saw our curfew passes, we were directed like ministers & helped in our mission. I called up every individual, placed the food kit, exchanged gratitude with my eyes & departed for my next battle. The beautiful A.R. Rahman composition of Swadesh was humming in my mind,”ye Rasta hain keh raha ab mujhse, Milne ko hain koi ab tujhse”. Although I did not interact with any individual but I remember the smile of a visually impaired girl who looked so relieved. We hung our boots after driving for over 6 hours but it seemed Milapji wanted more. There was a realisation that so many Indians are not even getting a morsel of food & I was so privileged that I don’t have to worry about these things.
Karuna is really contagious because it also bit our Grocer Arunji who gave crates of water bottles, juices & biscuits to our volunteers saying, “aap logon ke himmat ko salaam aur ye meri taraf se”
Project Delhi salutes the spirit of such Heroes who are spreading Karuna kindness & establishing ripples of meaningful connections with this world.
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