Youth take lead in serving the hungry people

Hundreds of migrant labourers sitting under the shade of a tree with empty plates in their hands are on their feet in a trice, as the sound of approaching vehicles reaches the ears at Guddeangadi, near Kuloor.

Soon the sight of youth on two motorcycles and a car appearing at the end of the road, triggers chaos as men, women push and curse each other for jumping the queue.

The youth swiftly park their motorcycles and ensure that the migrant labourers receiving free mid-day meals from volunteers of Kalpa Trust and Kudroli Shri Gokarnanatheshwara temple and do not violate social distancing rules.

The lockdown enforced to contain Covid-19, has left migrant labourers, particularly those without BPL cards, in a miserable state.

The initiative to help such labourers has witnessed unprecedented outpouring of support from all quarters. The youth have been playing a crucial role in providing logistics support to non-government organisations (NGOs) and identifying the hungry labourers.

A team, led by Ajit, Vijay and Bhavani Shankar, has been contacting multiple associations in Kavoor and pooling their resources in order to reach out to more people who have not had a morsel of food for days.

Ismail Usman of Ballal Cross road also makes sure that the recipients of food kits from other organisations do not join the queue to receive mid-day meal and deprive others of food.

These youth have gone beyond the role of co-ordinating between different agencies.

For instance, Ismail, a petty shop owner, regularly donates rice, vegetables, pulses to the mid-day meal programme of NGOs.

Youth like Vicky, Yatish, Shravan, Chaitanya, Maanas, Nagaraj, Harshad, Deepak and Harshith Devadiga have begun surveying and listing families that don’t have BPL cards.