Gujarat: Kutch villagers gave gifts to BSF jawans from Rs 1.25 lakh collected in 3 years as donation

RAJKOT: Practically sharing its backyard fence with the international boundary bordering Pakistan, Kutch had historically held its fort and remained vigilant along with India's armed forces. Perhaps this had also fostered a special kinship of the villagers with the men in uniform at the borders - sharing joy and grief with equal measure.
Thus, when the Pulwama tragedy shook the country, villagers of this twin hamlets in Bhuj taluka - Sukhpar and Madanpur - located about 7km off the district headquarters organized a prayer meet not just for the martyrs, but also extended a donation of Rs5 lakh to help the families of the martyrs.
In that very meeting, they also decided to put two donation boxes at two temples in the villages where the people were asked to contribute at least Re 1 every day voluntarily for a noble cause. Time went by and recently, the leaders of the villages having a combined population of 22,000 decided to check the outcome of their appeal and were stunned by the villagers' benevolence.
Ramji Velani, a village leader, told TOI, "We kept dropping money in the boxes since the Pulwama attack and now both the boxes were full. After we opened the boxes, we found a total collection of Rs 1.25 lakh in it."
As a mark of their deep appreciation for the Border Security Force personnel (BSF), who despite immense hardship in the arid desert, have kept the borders safe for the villagers, they decided to gift the forces with items that they require from the amount collected.
Suresh Vaghani another villager along with Velji Vekariya then approached the Lakhpat Lakinala chowki of BSF, around 80km away from their village and apprised the authorities about their desire. After discussion, the villagers bought air coolers, deep fridge, fans, water jugs, water tanks, table and chairs for the personnel. When these gifts were a token of love, it had to be sweetened too as per tradition and so, the white goods went to the chowki as 'prasad' along with Kutch's famous dates and mangoes, right from a simple ceremony held in the village temple, where the local womenfolk performed a ritual for the personnel's well-being too.
In return, grateful jawans reached the village to thank the villagers. Almost 25% of families here have members settled abroad, while the remaining people have small businesses or agricultural land and some are even engaged in carpentry and blacksmith work. Happy villagers now vow that once this collection-to-donation effort started for the armed forces' welfare, it will remain as a tradition for generations to come.