Twenty-one-year-old K. Rajesh pursues an engineering degree at a city college, and through the lockdown period, especially during June, he kept himself busy. It was not studies he was occupied with, but volunteering work in containment areas.
The Aminjikarai police were looking for volunteers, and Rajesh and seven other youngsters from M.M. Colony in Aminjikarai stepped up to the plate.
These young resident-volunteers take up a range of volunteering work, including purchase of groceries, vegetables, medicines for senior citizens and delivery of bubble-top water cans. They also assist in getting those down with an illness to the nearby health centres and clinics for a check-up.
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“As these youngsters are known to most of the residents in the locality, they do not hesitate to seek their help whenever needed,” says R.B. Vikanandran, inspector (Law & Order), Aminjikarai police station.
Vikanandran says a similar initiative was introduced in the neighbouring Azad Nagar where it proved very successful.
“So, we decided to try it out in M.M. Colony, as it was a containment zone.”
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Volunteers are divided into four teams with each having two volunteers covering three streets of M.M. Colony. They are provided with temporary identity cards and allowed outside the containment area with necessary safety measures including hand gloves and face masks. The primary work of these young volunteers is to help senior citizens in the neighbourhood get certain necessities including medicines and vegetables from shops. “Many residents in the area have our phone numbers so that they could seek our help. We along with health workers of the civic body also visit them on a daily basis along,” says S. Satish, a resident.
Located along the Cooum river, M.M. Colony comes under Zone- 8 (Anna Nagar). It has narrow lanes and is densely populated. Monitoring teams from the police and the civic body have been set up to prevent movement of residents from the neighbourhood.