Report of Tilganga Project Manager, Mr. Khim Gurung
Dear all,
We (Dr. Suman, Krishna Gopal & myself) returned yesterday from badly affected zone after distributing little dry food to victims. The situation in that area is horrible. The people are in panic. More than 90% (18,000) houses were collapsed, thousands of animals were killed, about thousand people have died, thousands of people were injured, several health clinics, school building are badly damaged. Electricity is also blocked.
When we started to distribute the food, we realised that the dry food is not enough. They need solid food such as rice which they can cook and eat. There own food is under collapsed houses. A little amount of food they have taken out, some borrowed from neighbours and shared among themselves. People are living together under poorly managed tents. However, they are living together helping each other and saving from hunger. But the question is, how long they will go??? However, they are trying to take out remaining foods from their collapsed houses, that is very very tough and they are being able to take out very little amount of food, their cloths and other accessories. Very, very tough time for all of the victims.
On first day of dry food distribution, after we realised that dry food is not enough, we informed to Tilganga management team about the need of rice and requested to arrange some rice and other accessories. Fortunately, we succeeded to distribute some amount of rice to a community of very poor area. That will help them to survive and search for more foods from other sources. Furthermore, we distributed two solar panel for mobile charge and water purifier. To prevent outbreak of diarrhoea, cholera etc, we delivered health education about hygiene, safe drinking water, temporary toilet construction and use and health check up in case of any health problem occurrence. Good thing is, that the government and other organisations have also started to distribute the foods in very remote area after our action.
We will report and share our learnings to Dr Ruit and team today. Let’s see how we plan to move forward to be part of our suffering communities.
For your information, Tilganga family has decided to contribute 2 days of salary and some of them more days of their salary.
Thanks to all of you for your great support. Some pictures from our field visit are attached.
Thanks and regards,
Khim Gurung