Indian-Americans play key role in post-Harvey relief, aim to raise $1 mn

As families start to move back into houses, over 800 volunteers of Indian NGOs helped those affected

Several Indian-Americans and various organisations of the community are playing a key role in relief and reconstruction work as the US state of Texas crawls back to normalcy after the destruction caused by Hurricane Harvey.

Nearly two weeks after Harvey made landfall in Texas, mounds of garbage, sheet-rock clusters, computer monitors and furniture still cover the sidewalks as volunteers work to clear the mess caused by the storm.

The efforts of government agencies including the federal, state, county and city, police, coast guard, armed forces, Red Cross and others have been phenomenal in saving lives and providing for the needs of those who got trapped in the hurricane.

However, the amount of destruction and devastation caused by Harvey needs a herculean effort to speed up the reconstruction work in the flooded neighbourhoods.

"Over the past two weeks, volunteers have already put in 23,100 hours of work towards various relief and rehabilitation projects and we have raised over $300,000 and the target is 1 million," Gitesh Desai, president of Sewa in Houston, said.

"We plan to support rebuilding efforts of homes that need to be fixed through a public-private partnership with US government agencies and many of the Indian American entrepreneurs in Houston," he said.

As families start to move back into the houses, more than 800 volunteers of different Indian non-profit groups coordinated by Sewa International are helping people clean up the mess that catastrophic floods have left behind.

Worst affected are the poor and less privileged communities.

One such community that Sewa International worked with today was the Cambodian Buddhist community in Houston. Volunteers helped clean up more than 200 mobile homes and trailer homes belonging to the community members.

"Indo-American organisations have been leading fundraising efforts and are planning to contribute to Mayor's Hurricane Relief and Governor's Rebuild Texas funds in addition to contribution in kind exceeding $2 million already," Jiten Agarwal, an IIT alumnus and founder of data analytics firm Expedien in Houston, said.

Indian restaurants have also opened up their kitchens to provide hot meals at various shelters.

"Houston restaurants served over 30,000 meals since the landfall," said Dinesh Purohit, owner of Cafe India, that has been serving free food and supplies.

Indo-American Chamber of Commerce of Greater Houston (IACCGH) is also reaching out to Small Business Administration (SBA) and plans to work closely with its District Director Tim Jeffcoat to organise seminars for business loans across the various areas in the region affected.