A Panvel-based ashram, in collaboration with the Navi Mumbai Police, has launched a rescue mission for rescuing the homeless and destitute from road before the onset of monsoon. SEAL Ashram started the mission from May 22 and plan to continue till June 5. The mission has been named as RESCUNITE 2024 — which stands for Rescue, Rehabilitate, and Re-Unite and aims to save destitute individuals from the streets who require medical attention and rehabilitation before the monsoon. “Our current facilities can additionally support up to 150 medically unfit individuals. We currently have 275 people already in the ashram. In the first four days of the rescue mission, we have been able to get 41 homeless people. We are helped by the police and also various samaj in different nodes of Navi Mumbai,” Pastor Buju Samuel, Associate Director of SEAL ashram said.
This mission is undertaken under the tagline #BeforeTheRains, emphasizing the importance of identifying and saving as many destitute individuals as possible before the rainy season begins. “The mortality rate among the homeless is significantly higher during the rainy season, and rescue operations become much more challenging once the rains start,” Samuel added.
These individuals, often severely ill or mentally unstable, are at high risk during the rainy season due to lack of shelter, proper food, and medical care. “Our mission is to identify and rescue these individuals, provide immediate medical attention, and offer rehabilitation. Once stabilized, we will make efforts to reconnect them with their families. Those who cannot be reunited will receive long-term care and support at our facilities,” the pastor said, adding, “RESCUNITE 2024 will be the largest rescue mission of its kind in our history. On a daily basis we do rescue people as and when we receive information but this is the first time that we have taken up a mission on a large scale.”
The Navi Mumbai Police are spearheading this initiative alongside SEAL Ashram as part of their humanitarian efforts to ensure the safety and well-being of the homeless on the streets of Navi Mumbai. The Pastor specified that the professional beggars are excluded from this rescue and the mission is only for the genuinely homeless and destitute individual found on footpath and roadside. Volunteer teams are being deployed by the ashram in different areas to identify individuals in need of rescue. These teams, along with the Navi Mumbai Police, are working together to gather data and to provide locations of the identified individuals. Once spotted, SEAL Ashram ambulances, staffed with experienced rescue workers, transport these individuals for initial cleanup and then to MGM Hospital for medical treatment. Post-treatment, which may take several days or weeks, they would be transferred to the rehabilitation center at SEAL Ashram. “Over the time, we would then counsel them and gather family details and facilitate reunions possible in whichever case. While the official rescue mission is set to conclude after 15 days, efforts will continue on a case-by-case basis to ensure comprehensive care and support,” Samuel added.
Established in 1999, SEAL Ashram is a non-profit organisation (NGO) dedicated to the mission of rescuing destitute and missing children from the Railway platforms and streets of Mumbai. Most of them are mentally unstable, worms infested, unable to feed themselves. The main focus of the ashram is to treat them for their both mental as well as physical issues and find their family and reunite them back to their long awaited families.
