Indian Railways Steps Out to Feed Poor People in India
With the help of its mega base kitchen, IRCTC is preparing food for millions of homeless people at major Railway stations of the country. Keeping in mind the taste of the people, Kadhi-rice is being fed in North India, Khichdi in East India and Lemon Rice in South India. Lockdown was announced across the country due to the spread of coronavirus. Central and State government together are working with their utmost effort to stop poor labourers to migrate. IRCTC has opened its kitchens across the country. Apart from local administration, police and RPF, food packets are being made available to the poor and labourers through NGOs. The railway is also taking special preference of local taste with food. The railway kitchen is providing ‘curry-rice’ to the people of Delhi, ‘lemon rice’ is being provided to the South Indians. The initiative was taken by the IRCTC to feed poor people specially the labourer class who were employed on daily wage basis and were unable to feed themselves. Also many of them were homeless and struggling for one-time meal.
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Piyush Goyal has directed all the DRMs to Provide Food to the Labourers
Spokesperson of IRCTC Siddharth Singh told “IRCTC has a mega base kitchen on the all major Railway statins of the country. He further said that daily food for millions of people can be prepared at once, so Railway is using it. ‘According to IRCTC Spokesperson, union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal has directed all the DRMs of rail division across the country to provide food for the labourers, poor and needy people with the support of the state government and local administration. IRCTC is bearing all its expenses. The food made here is being given to the poor, labourers and the needy living in the respective cities including the railway premises.
IRCTC providing Thousands of Food Packets across the Country
IRCTC supplies food for 20 lakh people daily through various stations, food plazas and online catering across the country. IRCTC is providing Lemon Rice in South India and Khichdi-Chokha in Eastern India and Kadhi-Rice in North. It has sent 7000 packets of Kadhi-rice to the Delhi administration in the National Capital Delhi. At the same time, 500 packets of Khichdi and Chokha have been made available in Patna, 400 in Gaya, 300 packets in Katihar. Also, 400 food packets each were given in Ranchi in Jamshedpur. In West Bengal, 1770 packets of Khichdi and pickle have been given at Howrah and Sealdah railway stations. Two thousand packets have been given in Bengaluru of South India and 700 in Hubli while 2750 packets with khichdi and pickle have been given to the people in Mumbai.
Six Special Trains to Transport Food and Medical Services
Due to the outbreak of Corona across the country, all passenger and parcel service trains have been postponed till 14th April. During this time only goods trains are being run across the country. Northern Railway has announced to run 6 special parcel trains to transport goods from one place to another out of which four trains will run from New Delhi and the other from Chandigarh and Moga in Punjab. These special trains will be used only for transporting dairy products, medical equipment and food items. This service will be available from New Delhi to Guwahati, Mumbai, Howrah and Punjab to Jaipur and Changsari.