Barodians provide help to needy during the on-going battle of COVID

In many current scenarios, people are facing many difficulties like – finding a bed for the patient, oxygen beds, requirement for BI-PAP, ventilators etc.

Sometime the patients have to suffer many hardships due to insufficient information. At the same time, many relatives who wait outside the hospitals need food and water during these summers.

Apart from that, there are other people in the city, who have been struggling to make ends meet as they have lost their jobs because either they had been sacked or their business has shut down.

Here are a few people who are doing their bit to help people during the tough times:

1. Zeal Shah

She is the owner of Pilates Studio by Zeal. She and her team has taken an initiative to feed the relatives of the COVID patients outside the Samras Hostel, SSG Hospital and GMERS for past 3 days.

The families have travelled from outside Vadodara, and are not getting food. So as a gesture to help them out, the team has been handing out food packets to them. The food packets comprise of – sukhi bhaji, poori, vaghareli khichdi, thepla and achaar.

The woman who has been making these food packets is a widow and has lost her husband to COVID. So, they wanted to help the lady financially, and at the same time they were contributing for the society.

So far, they have provided food packets to more than 600 people.

2. Bhautik Chauhan

He has been volunteering for the past 1.5 years and has been actively doing his bit in helping people in need.

He used to call up different hospitals to call them. Then he made a list of all the hospitals in Vadodara city and district. He contacted the administration, the nodal officers of the hospital and worked towards getting the bed on time for the patient in need. When the patient is very critical, he contacts the concerned officer in the District Panchayat, the doctors of the hospital, and gives complete information of the patient. Then the bed is given to the patient, and after that necessary treatment is given to the patient.

 In many cases, patients who face financial difficulties are informed about government’s MoU beds in the private hospitals. Mr. Yogesh Jagtap, Director of Jagtap Engineering, has been very helpful in this endeavor.

“Team Jagtap” with the help of SSG Hospital management provide food to the relatives of the COVID patients. They have also set-up a help-desk to manage and to co-ordinate information to relatives of the COVID patients.

3. RJ Ashish

He has started a campaign named “Rashan Jockey” from May 1st, The Gujarat Foundation Day. He has been receiving many calls asking for help. While assuring the availability of oxygen cylinders, beds or remdesivir injections was not in his hands, he decided to arrange for groceries for people who have low income in these current times or are out of jobs.

He has personally handed out the ration kit to more than 75 people. He mentioned that another 250 hampers are in the making.

Everyday, he puts 20-25 kits in his car, goes for a drive for three hours. He talks to people and if he feels that the person is out of job, he hands over the kit to them. He said “These people don’t know me. People like mechanic, flower seller, clothes ironing person, tailor are struggling a lot. I have also been getting calls from people who are working in electronic showroom, or people who were working in the factories who have lost their jobs due to ‘cost-cutting’!” He used to call them at a specific time at a specific time and hand over the kits to them.

The ration kits comprise of – 5 kgs wheat atta, 3 kgs rice, 2 kgs dal, 1 liter cotton-seed oil, salt, sugar and garam masala packets. All the items are of good quality.