Engaging voluntary organisations in COVID-19 and request to address NGOs as Nation Building Organisations

As the nation is going through the huge distress due to COVID 19 pandemic in both health and socio-economic spheres, voluntary social organizations are the frontline battling along with the government. Though the NGO s listed in the NGODarpan were called a few times in the discussion to get support for managing the situation, we are disappointed to note that not much engagement is done to make use of the social outreach and possible interventions the voluntary organisations can make. Now that we have come to a situation to learn to live with COVID 19 virus, we request the apex policy think tank of our nation to recommend to the government to provide financial assistance to the efforts of the grassroots voluntary organization in their efforts to find innovative solutions to reduce the socio- economic impact and health hazards of the pandemic and also recognize and engage such organisations in the grassroots developmental activities as Nation building Organisations (NBOs) and not merely as NGOs. This would be in the best interest of the nation to engage the social sector in the government efforts to handle this world wide issue and at the same time in attaining Atmanirbhar Bharath