| ISKCON Midday
Meal program continues to grow in India
Spotlight:
ISKCON Food Relief Foundation in Mumbai
Midday
Meal is a strategic program initiated by the Government
of India to liberate the
underprivileged children from
scourge
of hunger and malnutrition. One of the most successful programs
has been implemented by ISKCON Food Relief Foundation in Mumbai.
Video
of the month
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View
clip now
21 minute documentary
on Midday Meal Program in Mumbai
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ISKCON
Food Relief Foundation is an affiliate of Food for Life Global
and is a non-profit, non-religious, non-sectarian charitable trust
and
has been organizing the Midday Meal Program in other cities besides
Mumbai. This project is being implemented in Government aided and
Municipal Primary
schools for the benefit of underprivileged children. It is done without
any commercial motive or discrimination on grounds of religion,
caste, creed or sex.
In just three
years since it was founded, the program has scaled to provide over 100,000
hygienic and nutritious meals every day through an extremely cost-effective
program. MIDDAY MEAL has demonstrated and is now showcased as an operating
model that can strategically address two of the most pressing problems
for poor children in India : hunger and education.
MANTHAN an association of 492 School Principals in South Mumbai have
expressed its hearty appreciation towards this project.
Our goal is
to scale the program to serve over 500,000 children per day by 2009. We
believe
success on that scale will offer a model of replication
by other developmental organizations and State Governments across India.
To many of our children, the MIDDAY MEAL is the only complete meal that
they have access to during the entire day. This has produced dramatic
results in terms of enrolment, attendance, and attention spans.
We are seeking
your assistance to grow MIDDAY MEAL and to make it a model for addressing
a large and desperate problem for children in India.
ISKCON FOOD RELIEF FOUNDATION NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT
Together We
can make a world of Difference, remember the children of today are our
promising hope of Tomorrow, let us make our tomorrow bright
by working on our today.
Corporations
like Accenture, Nicholas Piramal, Reliance Industries, Sterlite, Apar
Industries, Mafatlal Industries, Yash Birla Group etc.,
have been kind enough to support the program with their benevolence.
Individuals such as Mr. Alfred Ford of the Ford Motor Company,
Late Shri Sunil Dutt, Smt. Indu Jain have given their full support to bring
the
program to the present level and to spread awareness about this program.
Should you need
any further information, please visit: http://www.middaymeal.com
Flat
rice and hot bean stew for survivors in Bangladesh
 November
2007, DHAKA, Bangladesh --
Hundreds of thousands of survivors were left homeless after the
deadliest cyclone to hit the area in a decade. Soon after the dust
settled,
a team of volunteers consisting of Krishna monks and Indian businessmen
traveled to Khulna, Bagherhat, Potuakhali and Barishal to conduct
several Food For Life programs for survivors. A large truck was
loaded with flat rice and Kichuri (bean stew), while the volunteers
traveled overnight in two vans from Dhaka to Sharankhola, Bagherhat
which is one of the most affected places by the cyclone.
"The
next morning when we arrived, we saw the local people were camping
outside under the sky, having completely
lost their their houses", explained relief coordinator, Jagatgur
Gauranga Das. "They had absolutely nothing so they were elated
to see us arrive. Mothers and children
gathered
around
our truck
quickly, but the crowd was so large and desperate that we could not
make them line up in an orderly manner. We decided to distribute
the 4kg bags of flat rice and Khichuri (Mahaprasada) from
inside our truck. Within a very short time we had emptied half
of the
truck at that place."
"We
then moved on to another place called Potuakhali, a 2 to 3 hours drive
from Bagherhat. Again, it was the same scenario
-- people living under the sky, mostly no food, no fresh water,
but somehow surviving. We distributed the rice bags again to their
great satisfaction. We had to distribute flat rice since cooking
facilities were not available at any of these places. Fortunately
we were able to distribute some amount of hot Khichuri (bean stew)
that we had prepared earlier at our kitchen," he said.
Over
three thousands plates of Khichuri and 10,000 kg of flat rice have
been distributed thus far among
six thousands cyclone affected people by the Food for Life volunteers.
A few of the daily national newspapers of Bangladesh have reported
on
the
Food For
Life program.
According
to reports, the storm was the deadliest to hit the
country in a decade destroying tens of thousands of homes in
southwest
Bangladesh and ruining much-needed crops just before harvest season
in this impoverished, low-lying South Asian country. More than
a million coastal villagers were forced to evacuate to government
shelters.
The official death toll rose to 1,723 and authorities
feared the figure could rise further as the country works to recover.
Remote
Volunteering / Fund Raiser / Activism
Food for Life is encouraging
people to give their time in their local area to help raise awareness
of FFL's activities and thus raise much needed money. It
is really easy to help. Simply print out the following documents and
distribute them widely.
Another cool way
to help is to add the following email signature to one of your email
accounts so that your friends hear about Food for Life.
- Email
Signature (Zipped HTML file - Add this signature to all your
email message)
If
you are interested in volunteering, please REGISTER with
Food for Life Global.
Get
your FFL World Hunger Map
 The FFL
World Hunger Map is available for $5 each (plus shipping).
Proceeds will go towards supporting FFL projects around the world. Printing
is limited, so order today!
Editor: Paul Rodney Turner
(a.k.a. Priyavrata das)
Food for Life Global
PO Box 59037
Potomac, MD 20859, USA
Ph: 1
888 816 6977
www.ffl.org
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