Coronavirus in Mumbai: Young entrepreneur starts quick ambulance service

A Mumbai based young entrepreneur, Jitu Lalwani, 39, is aiming to provide quick & cost efficient ambulance service not just in Mumbai but pan India. Unable to avail timely ambulance service to take his ailing father to the hospital for treatment who eventually breathed his last in his arms, Lalwani was haunted by the thought of how several families may have lost their near and dear ones in a similar manner.

Back then running a digital marketing firm, Jitu always had a thought of fixing this problem and then with his friend turned co-founder Nilesh Mahambre, "dial4242--one India one ambulance network" came into existence.

Lalwani told the Free Press Journal that he was very close to his father. "He always encouraged me in doing good things. My father's death had put a deep sense of feeling within me that this should be fixed. In a country we get pizza in 30 minutes, Private cabs in 5 to 10 minutes but getting an ambulance has been a challenging task. So we thought of changing this. Today I am happy that we are able to provide ambulance service that reaches on time. It’s been three years now people call on our helpline numbers even at 3 am and we are able to provide them the timely service. It is so gratifying to help people in such distressed time."

Interestingly to make the service cost efficient and to able to serve ambulance service to even middle income group families, so that they do not rely on government hospital ambulances, the dial4242 is paying 50 per cent of the availed ambulance service bills and many a times has even paid 100 percent ambulance cost. Lalwani said, "Those who are unable to pay, for them Dial4242 pays 50 per cent cost. We are doing crowdfunding on ImpactGuru digital platform and the money which is received from supporters is utilised for paying the ambulances charges for the needy and poor families."

Dial4242 does not have their own ambulance but it has tied up with other private ambulance service providers. It has aggregated with 600 ambulances across Mumbai Metropolitan Region and with 3,500 ambulances pan India. It has a team of 25 people which attend calls 24x7 in different shifts including team of professionals engaged in technical and advertising. Lalwani stated, "We want people to use this service as we are trying our best by sending ambulances on time. So that timely treatment can be availed by the patient in the hospital and the precious life can be saved in that golden hour, which is usually wasted while waiting for an ambulance." He asserted that in this COVID time his team was able to support the maximum number of people who were in need of an ambulance. "We have become a trusted platform now. And we can say this as the Mumbai Police through their Twitter handle always tagged us, whoever complained of not getting timely ambulance service. We were happy to serve them."