'We will give that food to someone who is hungry'

2 min read Original article ↗

In Tardeo, in south Mumbai, there is a wedding party taking place, with hundreds of guests working their way through mountains of delicious food.

But some guests here are not eating. They are dabbawalas. And although they're off duty, as it's a Saturday afternoon, they are wearing their bright white uniforms and are about to do the job they do best.

Unlike the regular paid work they do during the week (when they collect, transport and deliver countless lunchboxes to office workers all over the city), today these dabbawalas are delivering food to Mumbai's poor. As soon as the wedding guests have had their fill, the dabbawalas will take all the food that hasn't been served, pack it up and get it to a nearby street where homeless people are living rough.

This is the dabbawala's "Roti Bank" in action. Founded six months' ago by Subhash Talekar, the Roti Bank makes use of the legendary food delivery skills of the dabbawalas to solve the twin problems of hunger and food waste. It's a simple idea that Mr Talekar sums up neatly: "We collect excess food from parties and distribute it in slum areas where people have no food to eat."

Another guest at this wedding is Rushikesh Kadam, along with his team of 20 volunteers from his Food For All campaign. His research has shown that, on average, a Mumbai wedding wastes the equivalent of 50 meals.

It's an appalling statistic, especially when you consider that, across India, one child in every four is malnourished. So, like Mr Talekar, Mr Kadam is on a mission to eliminate food wastage and, whenever possible, the two organisations are collaborating.