Emergency rations in early months of the lockdown to the visually impaired

In partnership with Drishti Foundation

COVID 19 has raised many peculiar challenges, which require us to adapt to the need of the hour, and one such case is that of Drishti Foundation. Its Founder being visually impaired himself since birth, has founded the NGO to help a community of 400 families residing in Vangani near Badlapur, where the primary bread earner is visually impaired. The effort is to help them to live a dignified life through skill development. 

However, due to the pandemic situation, their immediate needs changed. The focus was now on basic sustenance for the families. As per requirement of the NGO, we immediately supported the procurement of ration kits for 100 families which included pulses, oil and essential grains sufficient to last a month for a family unit of 4-5 members. Challenges were faced in reaching the funds to the Drishti Foundation volunteers in the area due to it being in the red zone, which we quickly managed to work around  and deliver on our commitment to this community.

Employee Engagement with St Jude across various centres

In partnership with St Jude ChildCare Centres

Striving to inculcate the spirit of the “Joy of Giving” among the Arcil family, virtual workshops  as under were initiated with St Jude India ChildCare Centres PAN India to encourage the involvement of Arcil staff and their families in CSR activities Financial Advice Workshop (Svyam Samarth) with the fathers of the Jaipur Centre wherein there was active participation from the Arcil Senior Management including our CEO & MD, Yoga Workshop (Swasth Yoga ke Sung) for the children of the Kolkata Centre conducted by Sujoy Baidya, Art Workshop (Baal Kala) for the children of Guwahati Centre conducted by Tarana Prasad, wife of Sharad Prasad, which was a big hit with Arcil employees and participation from their children, Music Workshop (Sur Sargam) for the children of Chennai Centre conducted by Arcil’s own music teacher, Prosenjit Das from DMS Centre.

PPE kits for front line Health Workers

In the early days of the outbreak, our front line health care workers did not have adequate protection in the form of PPE kits. They were forced to improvise or go without sufficient protection and risk their own health as well as that of their families due to physical contact with them post duty. Lack of adequate protection also led to stigmatization caused by fear among the neighbours of these health care workers. Arcil in response took up an initiative to source a local manufacturer to donate 2500 locally manufactured PPE kits to Haffkine Bio-Pharmaceutical Corporation Ltd. which is the nodal agency to receive donations in terms of medical equipment and material for Government of Maharashtra. There were many roadblocks such as scarcity of raw material resulting in higher unit costs. Regardless, we managed to make these kits available timely during crucial times for distribution through Haffkine as per requirement to Government Hospitals, Public Health centres and Government Colleges across the district. We also received a letter of Appreciation from Haffkine Bio-Pharmaceutical Corporation Ltd. for this well timed initiative. 

Providing face masks as a first course of protection

Realising the need to come to terms with the ever-present danger of COVID 19 right at the beginning of the pandemic and for ensuring the safety of our employees, partners, agents, business associates, service providers and visitors to our office post lockdown, we identified a local manufacturer of face masks for procurement of 1000 units well ahead of completion of the lockdown period for ready distribution across all our offices pan-India. The face masks are washable and reusable up to 60 washes. We further sourced an additional 2000 face masks following our first order towards the end of the pandemic.  

25 ICU beds for Government Hospitals

While we have testing and prevention on one side of the fight, recovery at the other end of the COVID 19 effort was also a focus area for us. For the most economically vulnerable communities in Mumbai, Government hospitals are the primary health care infrastructure available for the recovery effort. Private hospitals though much more advanced are also inaccessible to the masses. Given the highest concentration of active COVID 19 cases in the Country, the communities of Mumbai needed all the help they could get. Arcil intervened in this situation to donate 25 much needed ICU beds to Government hospitals in Mumbai through a local supplier in an effort to increase critical care capacity.