Forty persons with visual impairment, many of them out-of-work hawkers on local trains, got a few days’ dry ration from two NGOs on Saturday.
People who depend on a day’s work for a day’s meal have been hit hard by the lockdown, which had come into force on March 25 to contain the spread of the novel coronavirus.
Among such people, the differently abled have been hit the hardest, said social workers who organised the aid on Saturday.
Pannalal Chakrabarty, 42, was one of the recipients. Chakrabarty, a resident of Durgapur in South 24-Parganas, was born with visual impairment and by the time he reached his teenage years, he was 100 per cent blind.
Chakrabarty and his wife Kanaklata, also blind, sold incense sticks on local trains between Sealdah and Ballygunge. With suburban train services suspended for over two months, the couple are done with stretching their little savings to the last penny.
“We used to earn Rs 150 to 200 every day. The savings we had is over. For the past two weeks, we have been living on help from NGOs,” said Chakrabarty.
Each recipient got a 15kg kit that contained rice, dal, potato, oil, soybean and biscuits. A pair of masks were also provided to each recipient.
“The stock should last a fortnight for a family of four,” said Chiranjit Gayen, a representative of Goonj, the NGO that provided the kits.
The recipients were selected by The Society for the Welfare of the Blind, a non-profit that works for the uplift of people with visual impairment.
“Many people who have lost their livelihood because of the lockdown are trying to make a living by switching professions. A mechanic is now selling vegetables. But blind people find it difficult to switch professions,” said Biswajit Ghosh, the secretary of the NGO. He is principal of the Ramakrishna Mission Blind Boys Academy in Narendrapur.
The NGO gave Rs 300 to each of the recipients.
The organisers went to several places in the city and its southern fringes — Baruipur, Garia, Tollygunge Phari, Ballygunge station, Kasba and Ultadanga — to distribute the kits on Saturday.
Debasish Das, 48, was one of the recipients of Saturday’s aid. A resident of Kalyanpur, the station after Baruipur in the Sealdah-Diamond Harbour section, Das supplies phenyl bottles to stalls at Jadavpur and Ballygunge stations.
“Some stores outside the station are open. But there is no way I can reach them without the train services,” said Das. “I worked hard for a living but there was a dignity in that life. Life dependent on charity is miserable,” he added.