KOCHI: In the thick of a disaster, help does not end with evacuating stranded residents. The biggest challenge is ensuring proper rehabilitation by providing food and other essentials to the lakh huddled in relief camps. The Indian Navy has set an example in relief work by setting up a community kitchen on the Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) campus, which feeds around 7,000 flood victims living in various relief camps across the city.
“The camp was started on Friday (August 17) and we have fed as many as 77,205 people till lunch on Tuesday,” said Lt Commander O Jayaprakash, who heads the community kitchen.“The camp was started following a request from the district administration. But a large number of volunteers have come forward to support us. They deliver groceries and transport the food to various camps located within a 10-km of Cusat.”
There are four officers, 17 chef sailors and 14 support staff at the community kitchen to prepare food. The kitchen works round the clock and provides, breakfast, lunch and dinner to the people living in various camps.
“We need 250 kg onion, 350 kg potato, 650 kg rice and around 400 kg pulses a day. For breakfast, we provide bread, butter and tea or suji upma. Lunch includes rice, sambar, vegetable mix masala and pickle. For dinner, we provide rice, vegetable curry and dal. On Tuesday, we provided breakfast to 6,172 people and lunch to 7,640 people. The demand for food has only increased during the past five days,” he said.
The district administration had requested the Navy to open the community kitchen at UC College where there were more than 5,000 people displaced by flood. However, UC College was not accessible by road and the team was shifted to Cusat. Many students, faculty members and IT employees working at Infopark had volunteered to help the Navymen prepare and deliver food to camps.
Apart from the six camps on the Cusat campus, the Navy provides food to people accommodated at Cardinam school, Bharat Mata College, Naipunya School, HMT School, Karunalayam, UC College and Albertian Institute of Science and Technology. On Tuesday, Navy started providing food to 1,800 inmates at the relief camp at UC College as the community kitchen there has been closed.“We are happy with the response of the people. Now many people have volunteered to help us. This is a heartening experience,” said Jayaprakash.