Mumbai, 29^th August, 2020 (GPN): Undertaking food assistance to support the government’s relief efforts to help the vulnerable populations affected by the Covid-19 pandemic in India, The Akshaya Patra Foundation has actively contributed by providing over 77 million (7.7 CRORE) meals over the last 6 Months across 52 Locations in 17 States & 2 UTs, in the form of freshly cooked food and food relief kits with essential groceries Food assistance, to address food insecurity that has compounded as a result of the pandemic Aid to wider demography at the pan-India level through a well-established network to support disaster relief Minimised risks of health issues arising from food and nutrition insecurity.

Akshaya Patra has been reaching out to people from vulnerable communities, such as daily-wage earners, industrial workers, labourers at construction sites, etc., across India, since the last week of March.

The Foundation is leveraging its existing state-of-the-art kitchens in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Delhi and National Capital Region (NCR), Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and Uttar Pradesh to prepare and serve freshly cooked meals through centres assigned by the administration.

Simultaneously, it is distributing food relief kits to vulnerable communities in these states as well as in Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and West Bengal. In states where the organisation does not have any existing kitchen infrastructure, relief feeding was extended from the nearest kitchen in the neighbouring state. The contents of these kits are based on the local palate of the region with each kit having a dry ration sufficient to cook 42 or 28 meals.

In this relief feeding endeavour, the Foundation has had the continued support of various state governments, corporate partners, individual donors and volunteers. Smt Sudha Murty and Narayana Murthy, have donated 10 Crores to the foundation. ENDS