A day in the life of social workerMeet the 'one-man NGO' who lives for others

Strap: Jaswant has never hesitated in providing a helping hand to the society

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, December 31

Jaswant Singh, a resident of Inderpuri, doesn’t have any registered organisation for social work but dwellers of nearby financially deprived localities know him as someone who is available 24×7 for his assistance. Most of the people visit him when authorities won’t help them.

“I have no particular field to work. I get call from public anytime for any job. Sometimes, I fight to get rid of swine menace in the area. Several people call me when sewerage line chokes and no officials of the MC hear them. I even fight for the sanitation in slums. I make rounds of the police station, DC and social welfare department office almost daily for the help of residents,” said Jaswant.

He is a teacher at a brick-kiln in Dhapai village under the umbrella of National Child Labour Project (NCLP). However, he has not been getting salary for last three years and it is reportedly a common delay in these central governments’ projects.

“I am serving the society for last several years. I don’t need any NGO to help the people. My philosophy of life is very simple: if we work for ourselves only then we are selfish. We have to do something for others. I have been doing it for long. From morning to evening, my doors are open to help anyone,” he added.

Jaswant often writes letters to the officials to report the flaws and shortcomings regarding functioning of government offices. He meets officials, tries to convince them to finish off the pending work. Sometimes, when things go out of reach, he demonstrates against the office and is also pushed to take help of politically influential persons to get the work done.

“I visit slums and find school dropouts or children who are stripped of the opportunity. Then we have to make efforts for admissions. When school denies it, we fight for the child. It is one of the major tasks, which I do with help of my wife,” he told.

He distributed 10,000 masks with the help of some organisations after the pandemic and keeps a vigil on the distribution of government aid released for the needy persons.