By Lissy Maruthanakuzhy
Panaji: A food bank for the poor was opened October 19 at the Church Square in Panaji, capital of Goa.
“The pandemic has been difficult on all of us and even after businesses are slowly getting back on track, these people are still left to beg for their daily meal,” says Rinton D’Souza, who initiated this project.
D’Souza said he was inspired by the social media posts of similar initiatives in Mumbai to feed the homeless during the pandemic.
“I sought help on social media and immediately received responses from a few friends who wanted to be a part of this initiative,” he told Matters India.
In his Facebook post D’Souza thanked the Panaji Mayor Uday Madkaikar, who provided the fridge and Anees Shaik who helped install the fridge at his shop in the city.
Explaining how he will carry on the mission D’Souza said, “We plan to spread the word via fliers explaining about this free food bank among most of the homeless people around Azad Maidan and Garcia De Orta area. Through this we hope we will be able to inform the homeless about the operating hours of the fridge between 10 am and 9 pm.”
Regarding the stock of food he said, “We will personally approach the restaurants in the vicinity asking their support in providing their extra food at the end of the day. The public is encouraged to deposit edible food—water, milk, fruits in disposable containers in the fridge.”
While requesting the public to be helpful he reminded about providing edible and fresh food items.
Feeding the hungry is good and it is appreciated.
The better initiative must be:
In India the Warehouses are overflowing with food grains. Quintals of food grains are kept in the open air. More than 20% of food grains are eaten up by rats and get spoiled by bad weather. The “Ration Rice” is smuggled from one State to another State. The Public Distribution System has many drawbacks. Hence the NGOs and Volunteers must fight with the local government authorities for the “fair and free-flow” of the food grains so that every ration card holder gets sufficient food items.
Why should we beg and feed? This is only a ‘temporary solution’.
We need to demand our quota of food from the government. This is the permanent solution.
When I was hungry, you gave me to eat – says the Lord.
The only Food Bank for the Poor that is known in Goa is the one run by Street Providence of Salgolda ( https://streetprovidencegoa.com/ ) performing yeoman humanitarian service and is well-known to all and sundry in Goa. I suggest that if Rinton D’souza’s motives are sincere then he should be volunteering and strengthening this NGO which is more Christ-like and ethical – Joe Dias
A good inititiative. Congrats
Rinton a very good initiative. Keep it up.