To end ‘everyday abuse’, Amitabh Bachchan lists his donations, charitable efforts to help India fight COVID-19

Amitabh Bachchan

Veteran actor Amitabh Bachchan on May 10 shared a detailed list of all the charitable work he has done to help India in its fight against the coronavirus pandemic.

Reacting to negative comments and trolls who have been rebuking him and other celebrities over their donations and contributions, Big B took to his blog to talk about how he has come to the aid of several lives distressed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Hitting out at critics he said he does not believe in publicising the charity he does but felt compelled to do so this time to end the “everyday abuse and the filth of distasteful comments”.

Amitabh Bachchan wrote in his latest blog post: “Over 1500 farmers’ bank loans paid off by my personal fund and prevented them from suicide.”

As the suicides grew, distressed farmers from Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, among other places, were identified and summoned. In the presence of the representatives of their respective banks, their loans were paid off. Each farmer was given the document that declared they did not owe any more money.

The senior Bachchan added that about 300 farmers from UP could not be present; so, a train bogie was booked for some of them to bring them to Mumbai. They were “received in Mumbai, put in buses, given a drive of the city of Mumbai, brought over to Janak, fed and given the loan cancellation certificate and put back on the train to their homes... all at my expense”, Amitabh Bachchan said.

Big B further said that he has also looked out for the families of martyred soldiers. He wrote in the blog: “The martyrs at Pulwama after the terrible terrorist attack, their families spread all over the land contacted and brought to Janak and given succour ... at the hands of Abhishek and Shweta.”

Additionally, during COVID1-9 last year, he had provided food to over 4,00,000 daily wage earners in the country for a month, feeding lunch and dinner to almost 5,000 persons in the city each day.

Big B had also donated thousands of masks and PPE kits to frontline workers and police hospitals using his personal funds. Donations were also made to the Sikh Committee that was helping migrants travel back home by inter-state buses.

Hundreds of chappals and shoes were further provided to migrant workers who had set out on long journeys back home by foot during the nationwide lockdown. Around 30 buses were also booked to help them commute to various locations in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, along with food and water supply for the journey.

Big B  wrote on his blog: “Booked an entire train from Mumbai to UP to carry 2,800 migrant passengers free of cost at my expense ... and when the destination states blocked the tarin from coming into their state and cancelled the train, immediately chartered three Indigo Airline planes and flew almost 180 migrants in each flight to UP and Bihar and some to Rajasthan and Jammu and Kashmir.”

He added: “And as the virus spread, donated an entire Diagnostic Centre at Bangla Sahib Gurudwara in Delhi to provide medical to the poor and needy through the Delhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee. An MRI machine and other Sonographic and Scan equipment of expenses beyond my means were set up in the memory of my nana, naani, and my mother.”

That is not all. A 250 to 450-bed care centre was set up with a further donation to the Rakabganj Sahib Gurudwara in Delhi. Soon, Oxygen concentrators will be procured. These will be brought from overseas; some will be donated to Delhi where the need is immense and some to Mumbai.

Amitabh Bachchan has also paid to get around 20 ventilators to be given to the Mumbai civic body and Municipal Hospitals. He even donated funds to set up a 25-50 bed healthcare centre at Juhu inside the Ritambhara School.

Additionally, three detection machines were donated to the Nanavati Hospital last week by the Bachchans, aside from feeding about 1,000 people from underprivileged background.

Two children orphaned by the sudden death of their parents were adopted by Big B recently and they will be put in an orphanage in Hyderabad and their education till 10^th class will be funded by the veteran Bollywood actor, the blog post mentioned in conclusion.

Follow our coverage of the coronavirus crisis here