“Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible”.
~ Dalai Lama
There is no denying that our actions today hold the key to our future. In fact, it is entirely depends on the way we utilise our free time and convert that into an opportunity to become an inspiration for others.
On a beautiful evening in Kadipur village of Haryana, a 7 year old young boy was complaining to his grandfather after seeing him distributing blueberries among the under privileged kids living nearby his home. The young boy got very upset and angry with his grandfather as he was waiting for the blueberries for a long. After a little retaliation, the boy’s grandfather said to him: “if someone had not helped and supported me during my young age, you wouldn’t have become a grandson of a proud Air Force Veteran.”
While recalling this incident from childhood, Shiv Dagar got emotional and said “This is a lifelong lesson I learnt from my grandfather and this incident taught me the importance of sharing and caring”. From this day onwards Shiv’s outlook has changed towards the underprivileged community. Later on as a teenager, he started providing food to the people from underprivileged community nearby his house which gradually developed as his hobby.
Shiv continued this till 2016 as his regular activity but then he felt the lack of sustainability and did a deep dive to find the solution. He decided to join a NGO “Roots Of Happiness” as an active volunteer. He started participating in the educational initiatives of the organization in slum areas. Along with educational initiatives, this organization was also active in various other campaigns throughout the year like blanket distribution, cloth distribution and providing shelter homes since 2016 by considering underprivileged community as their extended family.
In addition to above, Shiv also mentioned about the challenges he faced. He said “I belong to a middle class family and being a student it’s very tough to arrange funds to sponsor various initiatives. Sometimes I was criticized by some family members and they said that I am too young to do anything for the society and after a while I’ll sit at home”. Shiv found such critics as his true motivators as he strongly believes in his grandfather Chandroop Singh’s words “Believe in Karma and leave everything else to God”.
With the faith in humanity Shiv is working hard and currently they are a team of 62 active volunteers. Covid-19 pandemic came as another big challenge for the team and collective support of everyone was need of the hour. So, Shiv has registered himself as a volunteer with District Administration, Gurugram. He got the opportunity to support the administration in food distribution in underprivileged community. Along with this Shiv actively supported the transportation and shelter management initiative for migrant workers. Shiv along with other volunteers from Kadipur village has distributed ~21,000 masks and raised awareness about Covid-19 pandemic.
Shiv has shared the future plan and mentioned that the team is putting their best efforts to expand their initiatives beyond their village to cover various slum areas in the radius of 15 kms. Believing that every small effort and contribution will bring a change in the society.
Shiv Dagar is a young CA student and currently living in a joint middle class family in Kadipur village of Gurugram district in Haryana. He added that “If we invest our time on today in good causes, it will influence our present as well as future and it will help in creating a better world of our dreams”.
Few lines by Shiv,
If you find someone hungry, feed them,
If you find someone illiterate, educate them,
If you find someone without cloths, donate them.
If everyone starts taking care of the community in their neighborhood then soon India will become educated, healthy and wealthy. Remember “No Contribution is Small; FEED, EDUCATE, DONATE”
Keep going Mr Shiv.. really noble and great cause.