India's Non-COVID Casualties

His name is Vinod, he runs a small store selling beautiful handicrafts & Madhubani paintings in Rishikesh in the lower Himalayas in India. His livelihood is completely dependent on tourism which has been reduced to a trickle since March 2020. The last lockdown devastated him and depleted his meagre savings as he had to pay rent for his shop and house and take care of his wife (who doesn’t work) and his two young daughters. It has also affected the livelihood of all the artists he works with directly to procure the paintings.

I met him in my recent travels when the Indian economy opened up some. Despite his recent economic woes, I found him to be the most affable guy on this earth. Always smiling, didn’t complain about how bad things were even once during my multiple visits to him where I bought paintings and other gifts for friends.

With the brutal second wave and lockdown, he finds himself in the same spot as last year. I called him 3 weeks earlier to check on him, and he said things were bad. He was still smiling and didn’t once ask for help. I sent him Rs 7000(about $100) and bought some more things from him. And bless his heart, he gave half of that to another shopkeeper selling handicrafts as that guy and his family were suffering too.

I share this with you to highlight the plight of Non-COVID casualties caused due the 2nd wave and the full lockdown it resulted in. While Vinod & families don’t need ICUs and ventilators (and may the lord keep it that way), they are deep financial pain which might take months, if not years to recover.

The Situation

India is a desperately poor country where a majority of the population needs to work month to month to provide for basic necessities, and those who have the ‘luxury’ to save, don’t save beyond $50-$100, price of a night out for most of us, even in India.

India does not have unemployment benefits and can’t print stimulus checks. The government is oblivious to plight of people such as Vinod. They have exhausted much of their savings in the first lockdown, worse many have gone into debt.

The fundraising is directed towards medical necessities. Not much media attention is shone on Vinod and countless people like him. They are also not savvy enough to setup things like GoFundMe, which in any case is not permitted by the Indian government

People like Vinod and their families are looking at a multi-generational crisis of economic regression and lost opportunity and things look pretty hopeless for them currently.

What Can You Do?

Indians abroad and Work from Home Indians –

You have been generous with your monies to medical crises of COVID, please consider extending that in the form of direct assistance to your maid, plumber, electrician etc. You don’t have to look far to find people to help

And yes, reach out them. My mom and I have already helped 4 families (with more to come) and none of them ever contacted us. They are keeping their sense of dignity intact even in these tough times and the least that people with means like us can do is uphold it for them.

I keep getting asked, how much should I give? That is completely subjective as giving power varies. Giving however is important, with no amount being too small or big. Paraphrasing Dr Wayne Dyer who says, “I get so much that I can’t give it away fast enough”, cultivating an abundance attitude and gratitude helps you open your heart more. Also, happy to help you find more of both.

Share your stories of generosity and encourage others to give and do so. There is inherent goodness in all of us, sometimes it needs a little nudge and awareness, and it’s okay.

If you want to help Vinod directly, DM me for his Google Pay number, better contact him to buy some of his incredible handicrafts and paintings which will also help the artists

My American friends –

You too have been generous to various medical focused charities in India. And I have been contacted by many of you on how you can help. I’m focusing my efforts on direct financial assistance to families like Vinod. If you would like to help them too, I have setup a PayPal fund to collect donations which I will distributing them and will update in the page along with currency conversion. Link - https://paypal.me/pools/c/8zuGpoLy70

The great thing about PayPal vis-à-vis GoFundMe is no fees gets deducted and all funds go directly to those who are affected.

If you would like to purchase any of Vinod’s goods, I’m happy to get you on a zoom call with him and bring it with me back to US and ship it to you. Do it soon though please. He also has an etsy site

You can also venmo me @RajaSampathi any money that will go towards direct assistance of these families.

This too shall pass, for now, let us all do our parts