An Initiative By Tapassya (www.tapassya.org) an NGO, ideated and nurtured by IT Professionals of Kolkata, along with active support from all of youAnnual Dress and Warm Clothes Distribution Drive In The Remote Villages of West Bengal A Pictorial ReportFor a Better Tomorrow2011

Culmination of efforts from a dedicated team of Tapassya over a period of two monthsAlong with the support from organizations like Capgemini, Cognizant, Ericsson, IBM, Sistema Shyam TeleServices Ltd, TCS, Tech Mahindra and support from... All Of You

Trip to the villages of SundarbansDate : 5-6 November, 2011Villages : Around Satjelia, one of the worst affected areas by Aila (Parasmani Purba Para, Satjelia Bidhan Colony, Chargheri, Subhas Colony) Distributed : 360 new blankets, 260 new sarees along with old clothesFamilies served : 380

The Steps in between Collection of old garments from different organizations Carrying out survey in remote villages of Sundarbans and Purulia Sorting of garments into different categories age, sex, size Manufacturing of cloth bags to distribute materials Putting the old clothes for all members of a family into a bag as per survey report Labeling each bag with name of village, family member and sequence number Putting individual bags into big sacks and labeling them for individual villages Purchase of 1010 blankets and 860 sarees.38 blankets donated by a well-wisher. Loading of Truck and starting off for the destinations ..After collecting the old clothes, Tapassya spent around Rs 2.5 lacs in purchasing new blankets, sarees and transporation to remote villages. Nearly a thousand poor families served.

On our way to Sundarbans in the truckThen Boat Journey Our volunteers from different IT organizations

Anchoring in a village to distribute

The Queue Begins

The Queue Grows

Back to those days on the other side of Water

Distribution in Progress

Date : 12-13 November, 2011Villages : Ponra (Bagmundi), Ramdih, Chargali, Golamara and Para Distributed : 688 new blankets and 600 new sarees along with old clothesFamilies served : 516 (Ponra-104, Ramdih & Chargali 217, Para-128, Golamara 67)Yet to distribute : Another 300 families in Ajodhya hills by partner NGO, Kalyan. Ajodhya hills and surrounding areas are homes of very poor people, but politically disturbed. Kalyan has volunteers in those areas, who will complete the distribution on behalf of Tapassya. Trip to the villages of Purulia

Finally our first destination after travelling all through the night

In Ponra Village near Bagmundi Hills

A blanket, a saree and a bag of old clothes per family

Record keeping with thumb impression

You take this, I take thatOur Volunteer-In-Charge who led a team of students to sort the clothesThe Bag is also BlueArrangements in Progress Distribution to start in Ramdih

Let the giver bow down and give. Let the taker stand up and takeSw. Vivekananda

Our student volunteers, who worked tirelessly over last few weeks

A Blanket for all to fight the chilling cold

The SMILES - Our Biggest Rewards

Our Encouragement

We will have to wait for another year to see this smile

Thanks for giving us the opportunity to stand beside you

We will certainly stand up and walk up the road together

The JOY of Giving. To experience it, be a part of our next drive

A lot of Planning and Working over the Weekends and Nights

At Nanritams campus in Para block, distribution going on even in the dark

Wrapping up for the day

On Our Way Back

Thank You for All your SupportWe wish to serve 5000 families in 2012