I might be a Muslim by birth, but I always believed that religion, caste, colour, creed or for that matter the place of birth doesn’t matter at all. I was born in Kerala; but have lived majority of my life in Karnataka and a majority of my friends are from outside Kerala. Infact, a majority of my friends are Hindus and Christians and I love them as much as I love my Muslim friends. And I am sure that’s the case with most of my friends from other states and religions too. No discrimination; after all, that is what love and friendship is, right? And you might be wondering why I am telling you all this.
The past few days I was exposed to life of a different dimension. Actually a world of a different kind. A world wanting to help. A world without any discrimination. A world revolving around the power of social media. A world of Young enthusiastic Indians wanting to just help. No conditions apply. And a whole lot of this credit goes to the organisation which I am the chairperson of. #YoungIndians Yi Bangalore
When we heard about the floods in Kerala, the core team of Yi Bangalore decided to collect some relief material. So we posted just some WhatsApp messages, Fb posts and that was just the start…..the rest is history. I just can’t fathom where all those calls came from. I just can’t believe where all these material came from and where all these volunteers came from. I just can’t believe the amount of people I would have got connected over the last one week. Truly Humbled and mind blown I am. Thank you, all of those Good Samaritans. You have just helped me see world, from a whole new lens. You have just given me hope by being human.
And then in between all this and some personal emergency which is not the topic of discussion now; and when we collectively played our part to load so many truckloads (don’t even want to reveal the total number) of relief material; I started seeing some messages and clippings on social media which is very negative in nature. And I truly wonder why. Why would someone want to spread negativity? Especially, when there is an opportunity to impact something in a positive manner; why think negative even? When there is a opportunity to help someone; why shy away?
So, as one of the internet articles said;
Dear friends. Kerala needs help. Do what you can friends. Help Kerala. Ignore Kerala. But please don’t cause us more harm than we have already suffered.
Kerala & Coorg is going through one of the worst crisis which any place has ever seen. I have been to some of these places myself and you should too, to get a feel of what the actual ground reality is.
There are a lot of messages doing rounds about what is right, what is wrong, what is needed and not needed. My only request to you is, take a day off and try going to any of the affected areas or I will make it simpler, get onto a WhatsApp video call (if connectivity permits) with some of my #YoungIndians friends at ground zero and trust me; you will just stand up and start to #DoForKerala. You will just stand up and #DoForCoorg.
And after all this, I seriously wish the world which I got exposed to, in the last one week, stayed like this forever. A world without discrimination. A world filled with enthusiasm. A world filled with positivism. A world without borders. A world wanting to help each other. A world with a common purpose. A world of a different order. A world of a completely different kind.
#ThinkPositive #ActPositive #BePostive #StayPositive #DoForKerala #DoForCoorg #DoForYourself #Yi4Kerala #Yi4Coorg #DoForIndia #ThankYou #YoungIndians
P.S: if you seriously don’t know how to help, call or ping any of my Blr core team members given below and they will surely give you many an idea. Kaushik Murali Ajith Mathew George Arya Rajesh Kumar Nidhi Bala Naziya Aboobacker Gita MuthuavinashiappanVedanth Girish Suvin Narayan Nigam Lama Neil Castelino Karthik Kittu Darshan MuthaPriya Modi Sharada Shankaranarayana
If you want to know ground reality; Young Indians Bengaluru – Yi BangaloreYoung Indians
And yes, one final last thing. Eid Mubarak all my friends. May this Eid be the start point of coming back to life for all the affected. And I am in no mood to celebrating this Eid for obvious reasons.