Bathinda, June 20
The small sweet shop in the Dhobi Bazar area is where people here turn to in times of emergency. It was once a tea stall, but now the sweet-cum-bakery outlet functions more as a control room than a commercial establishment.
Virtually every household here has saved the mobile number 98140-74074 which they dial when in distress. They have faith that Vijay Goel and his band of brothers, some 50 odd volunteers, at Sahara Jan Sewa will come to their rescue.
It is an extraordinary story scripted over the past 30 years in the backwaters of Punjab and away from the glare of the media. The NGO that Goel built up today boasts of a fleet of seven ambulances, bought entirely through public donations and not a single penny ever sought from the government.
Volunteers and ambulances not only rush to accident sites, but they also look after patients left in government hospitals without anybody to look after them. Whenever a dead body is found floating in canals and other water bodies, calls go out to the volunteers to retrieve the bodies. They perform the last rites of unclaimed bodies too.
Calls pour in throughout the day and Goel claims to receive several hundred calls daily. The requests range from the mundane to the bizarre, from attending to animals hit by speeding vehicles or injured otherwise to handling a man bitten by a mad bull. In summer months the volunteers can be seen distributing cold drinking water at the railway station and other locations; while in winter they are spotted distributing blankets to the needy. On other occasions, the NGO is busy planting trees or organising blood donation campaigns.
No wonder Deputy Commissioner Rahul Tiwary and Mayor Bajeet Singh Birbehman are effusive in their praise. “They have saved the lives of a large number of accident victims and at times of crises, they have always risen to the occasion, helping out the administration,” says Tiwary while the Mayor generously adds that the volunteers are indeed “special” and completely dedicated to serving mankind.
Goel claims to have been inspired by his uncle, Kishori Lal. Although his own business was not doing too well and suffered due to lack of attention, Lal never hesitated in rushing to the aid of people in distress, people who he saw as less fortunate than himself. It left an indelible impression on Goel, who owned a tea stall when he set up the NGO way back in 1989. He had an old scooter then, and rode on it extensively reaching out to people. Three of his friends came forward to help him and today there are around 50 volunteers who work selflessly, spending money of their own to help others.
Goel obviously is a man with the courage of his conviction. Recently he caused ripples by his decision to adopt two orphans, a boy and a girl. Both of them had been tested HIV positive, but that did not deter the braveheart. Today both the girl, all of seven-year-old, and the boy, older by four years, are members of his family and their education and medical needs are looked after by the Goels.
The NGO, says Goel, has a modest annual expenditure of Rs. 15 lakh, every paise of which, he insists, is paid by people. “I have always kept away from politics and religion,” says he.
