‘Morality’ bank to reward good Samaritans in Chinese city

May 24, 2015 10:56 pm | Updated 10:56 pm IST - Beijing:

To encourage kind acts, a ‘morality’ bank has been opened in a north-eastern Chinese city through which people can exchange points earned by good deeds for free services like haircut and health checkup.

Citizens in Yanji City, Jilin Province, can accumulate credits with the bank, operated by Danying Community, through tasks such as collecting plastic bags off the streets (10 points), handing in lost wallets (50 points) and donating blood (200 points).

Top credit earning deeds include helping others in a dangerous situation (300-500 points) and donating hematopoietic stem cells (1,000 points), state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Credits can be exchanged for rewards such as a free haircut (150 points), home cleaning (500 points) or a health check (1,200).

People who collect more than 6,000 points will win the accolade “Models of Community Morals.”

Over 600 citizens have opened accounts since the bank was established on May 14, said Wang Shuqing, a community official.

“The phones have not stopped ringing,” she said.

Emerging as a novel way to encourage kind acts in 2002 in several Chinese cities including Changsha and Wenzhou, morality banks, however, also have their critics, who say the programme sullies good deeds because of the materialistic nature of the scheme.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.