Why am I fundraising?

At 11.30 am on December 7 a fire ravaged Damu Nagar, a slum on a hillock overlooking Kandivali Lokhandwala Complex in Mumbai. Cooking gas cylinders exploded one after another and over 800 families lost everything but the clothes on their back. Siddharth Gajanan Sasani, a 24 year-old visually challenged musician, was one of the victims and lost his keyboard, set of speakers and amplifiers, which he had recently purchased keeping in mind the wedding season, along with every other belonging he had.

This, however, is not the first time tragedy has struck Sasani. In 2008, Sasani was at a Ganpati pandal playing dhol when he was attack with acid. He had just appeared for his board exams. “He called to inform me that he would be sleeping at the pandal itself since it was late. Someone came during the night and poured acid in my baby's eyes. I don't know what they got by doing so,” his mother Kalabai told an iamin.in reporter. The police didn’t help, she claimed.

Lost his livelihood 

“I was scheduled to perform at about 15 places and I can’t. I have no way to feed my family," Sasani, who is married and has a child said.

What do I plan to do with the funds?

Bridge India, a Mumbai-based not-for-profit organization and the on-ground partners for research, volunteer mobilization, aid distribution to help victims of the Kandivali Fire, will take the funds raised on Milaap and accompany Sasani to a store and purchase the equipment that will allow him to get back on his feet.

Iamin.in, a hyper local news and citizen engagement platform run by Zee Digital Corporation Limited, will monitor and document the rehabilitation efforts. 

Iamin.in and Bridge India will together continuously follow-up on Sasani and provide information to contributors about how he has utilized the aid and how it has changed his life.