Serving villages and slums during Ashvin Navratri 2022
Nawan Nagar, October 2022
In addition to offering charitable services during Ashvin Navratri at Nawan Nagar, VMRK also organized charity programs to serve the residents in nearby impoverished villages and slums.
Free medical camps
Every day, VMRK’s team of volunteers, including doctors and pharmacists, visited different slum areas within a 10-kilometer radius around Nawan Nagar. At each place, they set up a free medical camp. Each day, more than 150 slum inhabitants—adults and children—availed the free medical consultation and medicines prescribed by VMRK’s medical team. Receiving professional medical treatment and medicines was a godsend for these people who are poor and cannot afford doctors visits or medicines.
Distributing personal hygiene kits
Alongside the medical camps, VMRK volunteers distributed personal hygiene kits to the locals. These hygiene kits had been carefully assembled and packaged by the participants of the Ashvin Navratri festival at the VMRK center in Nawan Nagar. With patience and quiet anticipation, the slum residents assembled in a line to receive the personal hygiene kits. Inside each kit was a tube of toothpaste, a toothbrush, a bar of bath soap, and a nail cutter. Though these kits may seem modest, they were much appreciated by the slum residents who can barely afford the simplest of basic needs.
Donating educational materials to students
During the 9-day event, VMRK volunteers visited 29 schools in 26 villages in the nearby remote hilly areas surrounding Nawan Nagar. These villages are difficult to reach and some schools are only accessible through unpaved or unmaintained roads that are in very poor condition. In some extreme cases, it isn’t even possible to drive to the schools. Instead these schools can only be reached by walking through the hills and crossing small creeks.
The students in these remote villages walk 2-3 kilometers daily in all weather conditions to go to school. They do not have proper school bags to carry their notebooks and textbooks. Additionally, there is no clean drinking water available at their schools.
To help these students, VMRK donated and distributed a total of 1,203 school bags. Inside each bag there were colored pens, a geometry box, 2 notebooks, and a tri-power kit consisting of a pencil, sharpener, eraser, and ruler. A water bottle was also put into each bag, so students can bring clean drinking water from their homes.
The students were overjoyed to receive these gifts and the school staff expressed appreciation for the donated items.