At this time of crisis in the wake of COVID-19, while the government is doing everything in their capacity, India Inc. has also joined in the efforts to lend their support. The Prestige Group, one of India’s biggest and most successful developers, through the Prestige Foundation, are providing meals and provisions to daily wage workers, underprivileged children and the needy across the cities of Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kochi and Mysuru daily. They have served over 1.3 million meals till date. They have also given provisions for the month to over 19,000 families, as well as to hospitals, churches and orphanages. And these numbers are set to go up exponentially in the days to come. They have also set up a 24-hour national helpline to aid the needy.
Irfan Razack - CMD, Prestige Group said, “Historically, the daily wage sector in India has been largely disorganised, as a result of which there is a vast majority of daily wagers who are not registered with the state welfare boards. In the wake of COVID-19, the central government has initiated a process to release nearly Rs 52,000 crore as a short-term relief to construction workers across the country. However, that still leaves a huge amount of unregistered labourers who have lost access to any earnings, with no means to feed themselves and their families during this crisis.”
At Prestige, realising that the pressing need of the hour is to first protect this section, we have started providing the daily wagers at all our labour colonies across India with the basic needs of the hour, namely food, water and sanitation, he added.
“At a time of unprecedented crisis like this, we, the real estate developers’ community, have to take responsibility for ALL our people. After all, it is a symbiotic relationship - we are as dependent on them, as they are on us. How can we forget their plight and leave them to their own defences in the middle of this? At Prestige, we are hoping to lead by example on this front to ensure that all our workers are protected during this time. With our 24-hour helpline, we hope to extend our help to the needy beyond the daily wagers. We have extended our full support to the government to aid in any way possible. We plan to initiate many more campaigns to ensure that our country’s most vulnerable are safeguarded during this period,” Irfan Razack added.