NITI Aayog reaches out to 92,000 NGOs for joint COVID-19 fight

The Government has reached out to over 92,000 NGOs, industry associations and international organisations to seek their assistance in outreach and for supplementing the steps taken towards combating the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

The initiative has been undertaken by the empowered group (EG-6) chaired by Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog, to coordinate with NGOs, private sector and international organisations for COVID-19 response related activities.

“CEO Niti Aayog has written to over 92000 NGOs/ CSOs registered on the Darpan portal of Niti Aayog, appealing them to assist the government in identifying hotspots and deputing volunteers and care givers to deliver services to the elderly, persons with disabilities, children, transgender persons, and other vulnerable groups,” an official statement said.

The letter also highlighted the need to create awareness about prevention, social distancing, isolation, and combating stigma; to provide shelter to homeless, daily wage workers, and urban poor families; set up community kitchens for migrants.

Between March 30 and April 3, the EG-6 has reached out to United Nations agencies, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, civil society organisations, and industry associations to enlist their support in the fight against COVID-19.

It has also reached out to startups including AgVa, Biodesign Innovation Lab, Qure AIDrona Maps, mFine, MicroGo, Staqu, who are working on innovative ventilator designs, testing tools, and tracking solutions to understand their scale and possible contributions.

NGOs are expected to play an important role in creating awareness about prevention, hygiene, social distancing, isolation and combating social stigma especially in vernacular languages.

Each NGO and civil society organisation will have to provide it FCRA details along with the type of support they are offering and the location. They would also have to submit the details of the amount spent, duration of support activities and the details of problems faced along with their suggestions.

Industry representatives have also shared with the empowered group the details of activities undertaken in public advocacy, philanthropy, CSR by way of running factory kitchens for preparing, distributing free food in coordination with local administration, making available factory hospitals, premises, guest houses as quarantine and shelter facilities.

The members of the committee include Vijayaraghavan, PSA, Kamal Kishore, Member, NDMA, Sandeep Mohan Bhatnagar, Member, CBIC, along with officials from home and external affairs ministries and the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), among others.