Update on collections & identification of families needing assistance in Ladakh

Funds collection

We have managed to collect Rs 1.06 lakhs as on 10th September 2010 in addition to clothes and other material.

Identification of families needing assistance
Munish Duvedi, Raman Sehgal, Dinesh Singh and Jasmine Yu (from AID Gurgaon) travelled to Ladakh from 4th September to 9th September. They met with officials from the Leh administration to gauge the areas where we could make the maximum difference. Their observation was that although plenty of aid has reached Leh but limited amount has percolated down to villages surrounding Leh.

As was noted earlier, we have been coordinating with a few locals (Gyalson & Kingshok (from the NGO Pragya)) to identify families needing assistance (we are grateful to JP Gupta & Siddharth (of Himalaya Trekkers Yahoo Group) for putting us in touch with them). They have been working tirelessly by visiting the villages most affected by the floods. They have identified 56 families across 19 villages whose homes have been destroyed and are in need of assistance.

The volunteers traveled to some of these villages (Phyang, Tia, Nurla & Timesgam) and met with the families. The worst affected families have been the one’s whose homes were located close to the river bodies. They are now residing in tents or school buildings. Other families in these villages (whose home were slightly distant from these river bodies) have not been affected much.

We will now help these families directly using the funds which have been collected through this effort. Our endeavor always was to ensure that aid reaches the affected people directly rather than not being utilized 'effectively' through a big fund. This brings us a step closer to our goal.

The details of the families and the extent of damage suffered are given below:

List of Identified Families

Future course of action
• Decide on items to be included in a basic kit with which to help the families re-start their lives/ gear up for the winters
• Procure the items in the kits and make separate packets for each family
• Transport the material to Ladakh with the assistance of Indian Army
• Disburse the kits among the identified families
• Pass on the list of families who we have not been able to support to other NGOs operating in the region.
• Scout for other NGO’s who will adopt villages and rebuild homes for the families.

Extension of collection drive
We are extending the collection drive till 17th September. Please ensure that your contributions reach us by then.

Note: Funds from this corpus have not been utilized for travel to Leh by any volunteer.