Arts
University students on a mission to Maligawatte
View(s):They went bearing very welcome and essential gifts recently into the heart of the Maligawatte underprivileged settlement, where almost all families have been hit by the COVID-19 fallout for more than a year.
Earlier, in the morning, 12 university students bearing the ‘Lifestory’ banner, all members of a project named ‘Lifeline’ gathered to fill to the brim 90 boxes with food and dry rations for distribution among the families in Maligawatte.
They picked on Maligawatte, as numerous people living here have been hit hard because they are daily wage earners, while many were also unable to work due to disabilities. With Sri Lanka getting into the vice-like grip of COVID-19, these humble people have not been able to feed their families.
As the undergraduates distributed the boxes, they too learnt a valuable lesson, getting an insight how the poor of the city live – amidst the sewage and the rubbish.
The undergraduates, Keleigh Berenger, Irushi Dissanayake, Sajitha Kandawale, Rakjitha Kandage, Mass Danah Kassier, Krishan Shanuka, Buddhi Abeyratne, Minduli Desapriya, Narendra Wettewe, Dinuka Kahandagamage, Shaveen and Reham, went home that day resolving to mobilise support to give a helping hand to the impoverished of the country.