A mother-son duo in south Delhi’s Chittaranjan Park has taken the initiative to distribute home-made masks for free even as the Capital continues to see a spike in COVID-19 cases.
Laxmi Das, 56, and her 24-year-old son Sourav Das are currently running a #pickonestaysafe campaign in the area by putting up dispensers at markets in the locality. The initiative began soon after the lockdown was announced and the Capital was reeling under a shortage of masks and PPE kits, said Mr. Das, a documentary film-maker.
“Just after the lockdown began I went and bought two very expensive masks. That is when the idea struck us. My mother decided to stitch the masks at home itself,” said Mr. Das.
I had already been stitching masks for villagers in Nainital even before the lockdown, he added.
The mask dispensers are made out of recycled boxes. “There are around five dispensers, made of leftover chocolate and hair dryer boxes, installed as of now. They have been made in a way that the mechanism is similar to paper rolls so that hygiene is also maintained. We were disturbed the way masks were being distributed by several agencies in a way as people could be asymptomatic as well,” said Mr. Das.
The duo has already distributed nearly 2,200 home-made masks, the raw material for which is being procured from a relative who owns a apparel factory. “The factory and production was closed due to the lockdown. So we have been procuring the cloth from there. We initially distributed the masks among those delivering groceries and labourers involved in construction and later expanded it to the dispensers,” added Mr. Das.