Humanity first: Retired Kashmir teacher offers to cook meals for COVID positive families

Srinagar: Last few days have been traumatic for retired headmaster Yasmeen Jan Bodha. Flashback of news reports about a sharp spike in COVID cases and entire families turning positive have been playing in her mind.

Confined to her home, she has been thinking of reaching out to the COVID families with help, but to no avail.

Enter her social media savvy daughter; she has been able to reach out to the people in distress.

To start with, she has offered to cook food for the COVID-positive families who have no one to tend to them. She has decided to prepare food at home and distribute it to the families who are under home isolation.

“I was wondering how the families, whose all members have tested positive, would be preparing meals. There is no one to tend to them. Therefore, I thought that I should do something. And the idea of cooking food at home and delivering it to their doorsteps struck my mind. Since we are staying at home, I told my daughter to spread the word,” said Yasmeena, who retired as headmaster of Government High School.

Her daughter Ifra Jan decided to make good use of social media and reach out to the families in distress. Since Twitter is flooded with SOS messages, she too offered help to the families who have no one to cook at home. She tweeted messages and tagged Masjid committees and NGOs to spread the word about home-cooked food for COVID families.

“She was pained to see the plight of people. Like every mother, she was worried particularly about the food. Therefore, she said she wanted to do something for these families who have no one at home to take care of food and other needs,” she said.

It was decided that Yasmeena would cook food and her elder daughter will go out and drop food at the doorsteps of the families. “This too shall pass. She said there are many families who would require our help. So she said she would prepare the meals and my elder sister will distribute them. It will be a very small contribution to humanity,” said Ifra.

Ifra said they have received an encouraging response from the people, though no one has come forward seeking meals. “We have made a small beginning. It is just two days since we reached out. We have tagged Masjid committees so that they can facilitate and reach out to the people who require it the most,” she said.