Indian Youth Congress offers to help Afghan refugees in Delhi

The Congress’s youth wing on Monday again responded to a call for help from a foreign diplomatic mission in New Delhi, a day after the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) government frowned upon its delivery of the oxygen cylinders for the Covid-19 patients at the High Commission of New Zealand and Embassy of Philippines in the national capital.

The Indian Youth Congress responded to a tweet by Kabul’s envoy to New Delhi, Farid Mamundzay, who sought humanitarian and medical aid for Afghan refugees living in Delhi, where the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic wreaked havoc.

The Embassy of Afghanistan apparently took note of the way External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar reacted to the acceptance of the IYC’s oxygen cylinders by the two other foreign diplomatic missions in New Delhi. Mamundzay did not directly respond to the offer of help from Srinivas. He, however, responded to another tweet and provided the phone number of an organization coordinating delivery of medical and humanitarian aid to Afghan refugees in Delhi.

Read | Red-faced government says don't hoard as Congress youth wing delivers oxygen to Philippines, NZ High Commissions

“Afghan refugees living in New Delhi are among one of the worst affected groups in India due to the recent covid (Covid-19) surge. Life was already a struggle for many of the 20,000 Afghans and pandemic has made their survival even more precarious,” Mamundzay posted on Twitter. He also informed that the Embassy of Afghanistan had taken a number of initiatives to support them with medical and humanitarian supplies.

“Any assistance, particularly medical help with this community would be greatly appreciated. I thank all those agencies & (and) individuals for their assistance, mostly medical over the past week. Together we will overcome this!” added Mamundzay.

The tweet from Afghanistan’s ambassador to India received a response from B V Srinivas, the president of the IYC. “Mr Ambassador, We are happy to help our Afghani brothers & (and) sisters here in India. Kindly DM further details about medical & (and) other assistance needed in New Delhi.”

Ever since the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic hit Delhi and adjoining areas along with the rest of the country, Srinivas and his team of the IYC activists have been responding to distress calls on social media from the families of the patients infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus, delivering either medicines or oxygen cylinders or arranging beds at the Intensive Care Units of the hospitals.

The IYC activists delivered oxygen cylinders to the Embassy of the Philippines and the High Commission of New Zealand earlier. With PM Narendra Modi’s government in New Delhi drawing flak from opposition parties for failure to deal with the scarcity of oxygen for Covid-19 patients, the fact that the foreign diplomatic missions took help from the opposition party’s youth wing left the ruling BJP red-faced. Jaishankar tweeted that the supply of oxygen by the IYC to the Embassy of Philippines was “unsolicited” and aimed at “cheap publicity”.