Ahead of fears of 3rd wave, Navjeevan launches initiative for first COVID Care Mobile Van For Kids & Families of Slum Dwellers of the Tri-city of Chandigarh
PEC Alum & Project Consultant for Navjeevan joins hands in this initiative and appeals to all kind- hearted fellow citizens to support the push
Post his retirement from a Global MNC as Head-HR, Administration & CSR in 2018, an alum from Chandigarh’s prestigious Punjab Engineering College; *Tejinder Singh Bedi has kept his love for the city beautiful amid his passion for social service just as agile as during his nearly 45 year long multifaceted career in his various corporate, academic and media management assignments.
This despite the fact that during the last four years after his retirement from the industry in 2018 forced by a number health issues coming back to back, he has had to stay grounded indoors only — firstly because of a D Sec involving multiple eye surgeries including transplant of a cornea and then a severe attack of chikungunya followed by the lock-in constraints thrust upon all senior citizens by the dreaded COVID 19 since 2020.
And, now along with his entire family including his 18 month old infant just getting out of a nearly month long fight with the dreaded pandemic, as a project consultant with the Chandigarh based Navjeevan society, (http://www.dbcnavjeevan.ngo/) he is looking for all like minded souls to support Navjeevan’s new drive to introduce a fully equipped Mobile Van Dispensary (in collaboration with the Govt Hospital of Chandigarh) to serve families of the poorest for the very basic life helps and more for their kids residing in slums/interiors of the peripheral belt of the tri-city of Chandigarh. Says Bedi, “This initiative will be personally overseen by his colleague Reji Tom, the Director of the society based in Chandigarh along with his team
with the primary objective of reaching the most marginalized and the poorer segments of the society not easily reached or accessible under our normal systems.
Undeterred by the health and age related constraints, Bedi resumed joining hands with the Noida situated Felix hospital and could still carry on with his drive for serving society through Felix Hospital’s supported Blood Donation Drives and health check up camps in the region both before the outbreak of the COVID pandemic in the region and later on too banking upon the virtual avenues of reaching the community around.
Giving back to students, he has kept up with his selective webinars with the institutes inviting him for the same of and on. Within his own residential society and the adjoining villages in Noida, he has kept pushing residents and other local citizens to keep following all the protocols and preventive measures advised by the WHO and our own Ministry of Health & welfare ever since the outbreak of the pandemic in our country through various repeated calls, alerts and frequent write ups besides offering innumerous suggestions to PM Modi ji on his twitter handle as well as on the link to myGovIndia & participating in virtual musical sessions along with a number of senior citizens & other music lovers joining his network.
Bedi feels happy that during his long exciting journey handling a wide variety of challenges in the people management streams, he also got associated with some really great social projects like the -Make Love Not Scars (MLNS) leading to establishment of the first ever Rehab centre for victims of acid attacks in Delhi practically from a scratch, (and which also provided the storyline for a recent movie — Chhapak featuring Deepika Padukone in the leading role of a brave survivor of acid attacks who has fought for her dignity in the society as a role model for many others), MUSKAAN (Dedicated to supporting rehabilitation of the mentally challenged kids and adults in Delhi/NCR), KAMALINI (an exclusive life skills training centre for the women folk from some interior rural villages in NCR of Delhi), a series of Healthcare Camps for awareness & preventive check ups of the poor population in the remote interiors of Delhi NCR along with the Indian Cancer Society (ICS), a couple of blood donation drives and support for basic to vocational education opportunities especially for children from various EWS (economically weaker sections and other most deprived and marginalized sections of our society).
Although all of these projects by now are almost self-sustaining to carry on with their respective silent noble contributions to the society — those among the better off senior citizens now at the last leg of our life spans as can spare help and all readers of the daily world may like to check the present status of these projects at http://www.dbcnavjeevan.ngo/ (For Navjeevan in Chandigarh), https://www.makelovenotscars.org/ (For Make Love Not Scars in Delhi), www.https://kamalini.org (for Kamalini in Sohna, Gurugram), http://muskaan-delhi.com, (For Muskaan), and https://navratanfoundations.com/ (For the Noida based Navratan foundation dedicated to women empowerment & service of slum dwellers in the cities beautiful like, Gurugram, Noida & Chandigarh!
Says he that he remains extremely grateful to the unflinching support of a huge team of like minded Volunteers, Health & Medicare professionals, Community leaders tapped from various villages, Volunteering teachers & kids from some schools and the top management leadership of the progressive corporate houses supporting such sensitivities as much as the staff at the NGOs at the forefront of these drives for making all of these initiatives highly sustainable and for a lot of learning that all this diverse integration provided to him in the process.
(*Tejinder Bedi is a former technocrat, a people management cum CSR adviser, freelance journalist and a passionate singer)