A Brief Highlight on the Work done by Dawoodi Bohra Community in the Lockdown…!!!
2020 has been a challenging year for the entire world in which the entire mankind has been on a backfoot. We ought to live with the virus and change our way of living in this beautiful world. Although in this time of lockdown when we essentially have started talking about Health and Hygiene as our number one priority, we have got into the “New WORLD ORDER”. The Lockdown which arguably have helped contain the virus have also affected millions of lives be it the Financial, Mental and Physical way.
In this Blog, I want to talk about the various Works done by Dawoodi Bohra Community to which I proudly belong (you can visit on Dawoodi Bohra Page to have a detailed understanding about the community) during the Lockdown period and in the Corona Times. Though I may not agree with all the aspects and I am not an Ardent Follower of the religion, but Credit must be given where its due. Furthermore, I have tried to keep the Blog with only Positive things and avoided any Negative thing to give a wholesome view of the Good Work Done. My idea is to convey to the larger audience about the Institutionalization of various schemes and thereby achieve some objectives connected with Financial, Mental and Physical Aspects.
I am dividing this blog into 3 Weekly Sub Blogs where I will release 1 blog every week and discuss one topic in detail so that the Blog do not become a Sermon (Pun Intended). I am not planning to Bore you up on a Sunday Morning.
Let me take it you all through all the work done by the community one by one:
Sub Blog 1- “Food” for Thought:
On 25th of March 2020, it was announced that entire country would go into a lockdown. Soon after that due to restrictions, the Daily FMB Tiffin which is given to all the community members had to be stopped. So what is a FMB Tiffin? FMB (Faizul Mawaid-al Burhaniya- Literal Meaning is Blessings of the Kitchen of the Burhaniyah) Tiffin is a Daily One-time Meal service which is cooked in a centralized kitchen of the locality and then distributed to all the houses of the locality within the community. The tiffin service is one of its kind and as per studies and estimates the cost per meal per person comes as low as INR 18 only. Further this also ensures that no person, whether Rich or Underprivileged, of the community sleeps without Food. This is a breakthrough scheme which runs within the community from last 8-9 years and is running in India as well as all foreign countries where Dawoodi Bohras reside.
So, coming back to the after Lockdown announcement, it was decided that each and every household would get a Food Kit with certain items which would be obviously non-cooked. This Kit was given to the all the household which could run for over 20 Days. This was done for 20 days because the first lockdown was only for 21 Days and we were hoping that things would get better and Tiffin Service would resume.
Then comes 14th of April where the country again went into lockdown for another 19 days which coincided with the holy month of Ramzan. Now for Ramzan, as we all know that fasting takes place so people will have to stock things for the entire month as the Summer was heating up and people would go out lesser than usual for buying Food and “Essential” items. Now here comes a breakthrough decision from the community which according to me was a great decision “to provide a Food Kit for Entire Ramzan Month”. In most of the places including Vadodara, there was not a single penny asked and we would have given any amount as “Voluntary Contribution”. Another important aspect of this was that the amount of Food which was given by different localities across the world would range in the amount of INR 5 thousand to 12 thousand. Now according to me, in a time when Jobs are lost and there are lesser means to survive, this was a gamechanger and uplifted many people’s lives. Further, in my location (Vadodara, Gujarat) whether you need this kit or not (Read- whether you are rich or poor), you were supposed to take this kit as this would help avoid any unnecessary movement of people for buying Food and other Items.
I am putting below images of Food Kit which was received in various locations. Do have a look and we can have a clear idea how much thought has been gone for this.
The Below Kit was received at my Home in Vadodara and you can see the amount of Food which has been given for a family of 3 is commendable.
Further after this kit, due to extension of the lockdown, there was another facility for Kit introduced where you can ask for any item of your choice just by filing a Google Form and that would be delivered to your home. This was done in my Location in Vadodara.
Furthermore in the month Moharram every year when there is a community meal, this time where due to Covid Restrictions there were no meals, there was a facility where every household would get their Tiffin before 9.30 AM every day so as to assure attendance of the Moharram Sermons which I will talk about in detail in the next sub Blog.
To sum up, I would like to conclude that the basic necessity of the Food of Human was efficiently and near perfectly taken care by the administration of the Dawoodi Bohra Community. Yes there may be many hiccups, but we should always know that even Six Sigma is imperfect for about 0.000001%.
I am a believer of Institutionalizing various schemes and by that a society, a community and a country at large will always benefit. Dawoodi Bohra Community under the Able Leadership of Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin has been able to achieve one such feat and we ought to thank our leadership and all those who made this possible.
In the next week Sub Blog, I will take you through another important aspect of the work done by Dawoodi Bohra Community. Till then, take Care and stay Safe.
Hozefa Malek
