A 65-year-old woman reportedly walked 17 km to purchase medicines in a village in Dakshina Kannada on April 9. After a gram panchayat team noticed her, she was dropped in an autorickshaw while returning home.
The woman, Gangamma, walked all the way from her native place Gadikallu, near Kollamogaru, to Guthigar in Sullia Taluk to purchase medicines for her neurological problem.
Achyuta, president, Guthigar gram panchayat, told The Hindu on Friday that she purchased her medicines from a medical store at Guthigar for which she was a regular. Exhausted by walking the woman sat under the shade of a tree while returning home around noon. At the same time members of a COVID-19 help team constituted by the gram panchayat noticed her and called up the panchayat president. Immediately the woman was sent back to her village by hiring an autorickshaw.
Recalling another incident, Mr. Achyuta said that an ambulance from the Government Lady Goschen Hospital in Mangaluru was scheduled to drop a woman with her new-born baby and her husband, Naveen, at Kollamogaru village, about 125 km from Mangaluru, on April 7. But the driver of the ambulance dropped them at Guthighar and returned to Mangaluru. Later the Guthigar gram panchayat arranged a vehicle for the family to reach Kollamogaru.
Mr. Achyuta said that the help team members found Mattadi (aged 70 years) hailing from Galimukha village in Kerala staying in a bus shelter in Guthigar town on April 3. It was found that he was lying there without food for two days. Since it was raining in the town he was unable to walk. “I brought him to my house, offered him food and then arranged a vehicle to drop him at Jalsoor, near Sullia, on the borders with Kerala, from where he walked towards his village,” the president said.
Mr. Achyuta said that the panchayat’s help team comprised 25 members who have two-wheelers to supply medicines, distribute food packets and rush to any other help during the lockdown.
“There are five wards in my panchayat. A team of five members have been formed for each ward. We are all connected through WhatsApp. We have been serving the needy since March 22,” he said.
