It’s 6 p.m. The sun has sunk into the West and it’s pitch black outside. Inside, there is no electricity, no stove, no warm water, and your family is discontentedly huddled around you. Even worse, your cell phone, your only sense of privacy, is just about to die and the closest place to charge it is miles away, down desolate and lightless streets.
No, this isn’t hurricane Sandy all over again. This is everyday life in Chirag, India. “It’s like our Hurricane Sandy but it’s everyday for them; except that they don’t have food and flashlights and things like that.” said Student Government Vice President of Activities Corrado DeVincenzo, who witnessed life in Chirag firsthand.
“Often they’d use kerosene lighting and people would pick it up by accident, kids especially, would drink it and would pass away from it. Or they would leave their hut at night to get something and get bit by a snake or some kind of animal. So basically, after the sun goes down, it’s pitch black and they can’t function.”
Two years ago, on a SGO funded trip to India, DeVincenzo visited Chirag, which is an impoverished and underdeveloped village on the outskirts of Mumbai and Delhi.
Living in mud huts with roofs made of leaves and branches, the people of Chirag are socioeconomically alienated and deprived of many of the basic essentials of living such as running water, a kitchen, refrigerators, food and more somberly, light. Without any source of light once the sun goes down, life in Chirag stagnates and goes unnoticed.
DeVincenzo explained, “There’s no middle class. There are beautiful million dollar homes and outside you’ll see a poor person lying out on the street. The richest man in Mumbai, he’s one of the richest in the world, has a big 90-floor mansion where homeless people can be seen outside. We see poverty here yeah, but to them, it’s glorious.”
Moved by the experience, DeVincenzo found a nongovernmental organization called Project Chirag, founded by Jyotirmoy Chatterji of HR College of Commerce & Economics in South Mumbai, whose mission is to give light to the estimated 4 million people in India who live without electricity.
Supervised by the principal of HR College (who is also the sheriff of Mumbai) Indu Shahani, Project Chirag provides families in tribal villages with a light beam to light up their small homes and a lantern to walk around with at night.
However, Chirag, which literally translates to light, is a name more intrinsic of the people rather than the village.
Though devoid of bare essentials of living well, the people, says DeVincenzo, makes Chirag bright. “I noticed that even though they live much poorer than us, they were so polite. People would offer me their seat even if it there were no where else to sit. People would invite us into their house. One time we got invited into a house and our teacher who spoke Hindi, replied to them ‘It’s too many of us.’ and the owner said ‘Well my heart is big enough for all of you.’ We didn’t go in, but random people would always invite us in and were all extremely polite.”
Since his experience two years ago, DeVincenzo has been fundraising donations at New Jersey City University for Project Chirag in collaboration with the students of HR College. With $1,500 already raised for the cause, DeVincenzo hopes to surpass NJCU’s record of $7,000 raised for a cause before he graduates. With $80, one could light up home in Chirag for an entire month. All donations are warranted and 100 percent of it goes to those in Chirag and will also be commemorated on DeVincenzo’s wall of donors, where their names will be displayed.
To donate or to hold a fundraiser for the cause, contact Corrado DeVincenzo at [email protected].
To learn more about Project Chirag, also visit www.projectchirag.com