This week, immediately before Nepal’s new lockdown, some of the Purnima team drove out to visit further beneficiaries of the programme and I was privilaged to join them. It is heartening to note that Purnima as part of UK Aid has funded the provision of clean drinking water to over 200,000 people in the four worst earthquake-affected districts to the northwest of Kathmandu and that this will make communities more resilient to climate change and to the difficulties and challenges presented by the pandemic.
One of Purnima’s aims has been able to focus on the most challenged members of communities, and this week we heard another heart-breaking story. Shreeman who is 52 years old was a subsistence farmer in Nuwakot district. He is a widower who lived with his son in a small house that was completely destroyed in the 2015 earthquake. Fortunately the two men were unharmed in the quake. He applied for relief payments from the government of Nepal to rebuild his house but about a year ago while he was working on the reconstruction he fell about 10 metres and sustained a spinal injury that rendered him wheelchair dependent. Sheeman’s son has found some seasonal work but this was insufficient to feed them both.
Sappros and Purnima recognised the men’s difficulties and supported the completion of the house including a ramp for the wheelchair, appropriate toilet arrangements, windows, organised counselling for Shreeman and also helped set him up raising chickens. This has not only provided an income for the two men from meat sales but has given Shreeman focus and purpose. Below you can see his sack of wheat and cages set at a height that gives him good access.
This is part of Purnima’s Leave No-one Behind drive for rebuilding lives and livelihoods. You'll find other stories here:
Leaving No-one Behind and more about Purnima's work here
Purnima programme