‘Pehle Mann se Gaya, phir Tann se Gaya’ (first off
the mind, next off the body)
In his talk at the Rotract Conference, Anshu Gupta was
referring to the attitude of those who ‘donated’ clothes for the poor and needy.
Most donations were actually discards
and at variance to the real needs. In fact, the act of giving was a front for dumping
the clothing that one had lost interest in.
Anshu left a corporate job in 1998 and founded Goonj
with a mission to make clothing a matter of concern and to bring it among the
list of subjects for the development sector. He initiated a mass movement for
recycling and reuse of tonnes of waste material by channelizing it from the
cities to the villages, as a resource for rural development.
Goonj’s stand-out resolve is to refrain from dumping
donated clothes and yet ensure dignity while fulfilling the basic human need of
clothing! This is done by giving clothes for work of building bamboo bridges or
improving mud roads or empowering school infrastructure. These have united the
people to positively impact their own predicament and receive their rightful
drapes of dignity.
Goonj is considered
one of the leading social enterprises in India, the largest non monetary
resource agency and people also call it one of the largest civic participation
movement! While they have ensured that drapes have covered the shame, dignity
has not been compromised.
Indeed, acts of generosity
are hollow if shrouded in an insensitive attitude. Patronage is the bane of
self-respect. To create the right impact, it is important to unite our intention
of empathy with the sensitive consciousness of giving aptly as well as ensuring
the indisputable dignity of the one in need. Otherwise the donation would be
just an act of dumping and burying human dignity.
When empathy will ‘Unite to impact’ with
sensitivity
Every human being can be truly draped in
dignity!
- Pravin K. Sabnis
Goa, India.
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