Beneficiaries miss out as NGOs rush to distribute relief material in Patiala

Tribune News Service

Patiala, March 29

Providing relief material to the needy and poor in the district has become a tough task as NGOs have started visiting places without consulting the administration and relief material was getting distributed among the same people twice.

Officials in the administration today said none of the NGOs had been given permission to distribute packages through one-stop centres established at the Red Cross office in the city.

They said while the contribution of the NGOs was bringing relief for many people in distraught, there was a need to streamline the distribution of relief material to all people across the spectrum and not focus on a few only.

Poonamdeep Kaur, Municipal Corporation Commissioner, said: “None of the NGOs has been given the permission to provide relief material in the district till now as they have not approached our one-stop centre at the Red Cross office here.”

She said people associated with the NGOs were visiting various places on their own due to which the relief material at times was getting distributed among the same people twice. “This haphazard way of working can leave out other people from getting the relief material.”

Moreover, the administration has also started getting calls for food packages from people who do not need them urgently and have sufficient supplies with them.

She said some people had contacted the administration officials for food packages, but the relief teams had found out that they had enough material with them.

The Sarbat Da Bhala Charitable Trust has decided to donate food packets, along with sanitisers and other items across the state.

Dr SP Singh Oberoi of the Sarbat Da Bhala Charitable Trust said they had decided to provide all sorts of help to the needy through the administration so they would be sending food packets for more than 10,000 families across the state.

The trust will be sending relief material worth Rs 72 lakh, including 100 tonnes of wheat flour, 20 tonnes of pulses, 50 tonnes of sugar, 20 tonnes of rice along with sanitisers. The relief material will be sent to Majitha, Batala, Jagraon, Khanna, among other areas. The trust will also provide ventilators for Amritsar, Gurdaspur and Nawanshahr along with other medical equipment.