A faith-based group in Central Arkansas has been providing as many as a thousand meals at a time to area hospitals, first responders and municipal offices in response to the covid-19 pandemic.
Some 30 volunteers at Gujarati Samaj of Arkansas, a Hindu-affiliated nonprofit based in Little Rock, have been coordinating the preparation or purchase and delivery of meals to help those working to combat the virus at the front lines.
"They're putting their health aside, they're risking their lives to take care of [others]," said Girish "Gary" Patel, the nonprofit's chairman, of first responders working during the outbreak. "They work 12-hour shifts. They don't have time to grab ... lunch, so this helps them."
The effort is one of many faith-based and community group-based initiatives in the area for essential staff who are working to combat the virus. Nationwide, covid-19 has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and more than 1.2 million cases as of this week -- since it first began overseas in December.
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The volunteers have been coordinating efforts between donating takeout meals and dishes cooked at its community center. Foods prepared by volunteers are handled by groups of fewer than 10 people wearing masks, gloves and hairnets; all have their temperature taken before beginning their work. Other volunteers pull up at the center to load meals into their vehicles.
The group's approximately 1,200 members -- which comprise around 300 family units -- have donated the money to buy food, gas and other resources needed to make the outreach possible. Patel said members are based in parts of the state including Fort Smith, Forrest City, Monticello, Arkadelphia, Magnolia and the Hot Springs area.
Among those volunteers is Hershila Lallu, 24, a second-year graduate student at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway. Lallu is a member of the group's board of trustees, and over the recent weeks she helped package food and make deliveries. Among her most recent deliveries were meals of pasta and garlic bread for Baptist Health in Little Rock, to whom she'd taken traditional Indian foods a week before.
"We'll keep going as long as there's a need for it," Lallu said of the group's efforts.
The Gujarati Samaj of Arkansas in recent weeks has delivered meals to area hospitals including Arkansas Children's Hospital, Baptist Health in Little Rock and North Little Rock, CHI St. Vincent in Little Rock, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and Unity Health.
The group also has given free meals to first-responders, including 911 operators and state and area municipal offices including the Arkansas Department of Health, the Little Rock Police Department, the Little Rock Planning and Development Office and the Pulaski County sheriff's office.
The outpouring of gratitude for the nonprofit's work has been public and widespread.
"Wow, thank you to my friend Gary Patel and Gujarati Samaj of Arkansas ... for providing 1,000 free lunches to [Central Arkansas] hospitals, officials and first responders," Lieutenant Gov. Tim Griffin said in a post late last month on Facebook. "I love seeing Arkansans come together as we fight [covid-19]."
The Little Rock Police Department publicly thanked the group for meals it delivered to three of the department's offices, its headquarters and to 911 operators.
"The essential personnel are very grateful for the organization['s] kindness as we work in uncharted territory protecting and serving the citizens of Little Rock," it said in an April 24 post to the social-media website.
Attorney General Leslie Rutledge and U.S. Rep. French Hill, R-Ark., also are among those who have publicly thanked Patel and the group for its work.
The Hindu faith-affiliated Gujarati Samaj of Arkansas is named for the Indian state of Gujarat on that country's western coast. Patel said the all-volunteer organization has been active in Arkansas for several decades, and that its purchase of the building from the Shriners in 2016 gave the state its first known community center affiliated with the Hindu faith.
According to Lallu, spreading the values of the Hindu faith and culture is the goal of the group all year round -- with the general U.S. population, and with younger Hindu generations -- and that the work hasn't gone unnoticed.
"Many families are seeing the things that we are doing right now and having those conversations with their kids, and so it kind of opens up another avenue to [talk] about why this is important and why it relates to our Hindu culture and helping our neighbors in a time of need," Lallu said.
Patel said the decision to continue this particular effort by the Gujarati Samaj of Arkansas has been made -- and details planned -- week by week, but said supporting extra responders overall will be a long-term effort; the group is set to deliver 2,001 meals today -- 1,001 to Baptist Health in Little Rock; and another 1,000 meals distributed between area hosptials and first responders in Little Rock and North Little Rock.
"Our focus continues until the country gets back to normal," Patel said. "We're probably going to continue [helping] for some weeks. I think we're going to help where we can."
Religion on 05/09/2020