Four railway employees from Nagpur are doing their bit to help quench the thirst of villagers in drought-hit Latur.
This year, the state of Maharashtra has seen the worst drought in the last 100 years, with many areas of Marathwada and Vidarbha being severely affected.
There is a major scarcity of water in Latur, Marathwada, and the state government has, till now, provided over 49.5 million litres of water through Jaldoot Express, a water express used to transport water from Miraj to Latur, as reported by The Indian Express.
While the government is working hard to tackle the drought situation in Latur, four young employees of Central Railways from Nagpur are also doing their bit to help people in the remote villages of Latur.
Tushar Vighne, along with his friends Ritin Khatekar, Anil Puranik and Prashant Golait, started an initiative to provide certified water pouches to the people of the drought affected villages of Harunbhai, Nandgaon and Bhusmurd, with populations ranging from 2000-3000.
“We started this initiative through social media like Whatsapp and Facebook. Initially, there were only four of us, but later we gathered more and more attention. We thought of collecting water from different households but then we decided not to compromise with the quality. Hence, now we are sending certified water pouches to Latur through trains,” said Tushar Vighne, who has been working as a mail express guard with Nagpur Railways for the past 25 years.
The water pouches were bought from the funds contributed mostly by railway employees. Every water pouch consists of 300 ml water and each bag has about 50 water pouches.
“ We’ve supplied about 1000 bags of water pouches till now and are planning to do the same for the next seven Saturdays,” he said.
So far, Tushar and his friends have successfully transported around 15,000 litres of water through Nagpur-Kolhapur Express to Latur.
They have also urged the local residents and several NGOs to come forward and help them make a difference in the parched region of Latur.
If you would like to contribute, you can contact:
Tushar Vighne- 8600049104, Ritin Khatekar: 9021695720, Anil Puranik: 8600049364, or Prashant Golait: 8600049349
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