In the two weeks since the terror attacks in Mumbai, most of the large Indian business groups in the city have been conspicuous by their absence in offering help to terror victims.
Mumbai houses some of the biggest corporates in the country including Aditya Birla Group, Reliance Industries, Godrej Industries, Reliance ADAG Group. When contacted, these companies informed they did not initiate any welfare scheme so far for the victims or the martyrs' kins.
Mahindra and Mahindra, however, said it was in the process of assessing the needs of the victims. "We visited J J Hospital to see if there are some needy people," said Sheetal Mehta, chief, corporate social responsibility, Mahindra and Mahindra. "Education is our focus for CSR, if there are needy children we will help them."
Corporate India's indifference to terror victims comes in sharp contrast to efforts by promoter of Mumbai-based Charak Pharmaceutical Company's Raj Shroff, who has created a corpus of Rs 2 crore (Rs 20 million) and plans to provide the victims' families a monthly income Rs 25,000 for the next five years.
At least 183 people got killed and 293 injured in the terror attacks and sixteen policemen and two National Security Guard commandos sacrificed their lives fighting the terrorists. The terrorists had targetted two luxury hotels the Oberoi and the Taj and a Jewish prayer house - Nariman House.
"People forget about such incident once they get busy with their routine life. So, our effort is to sustain the families of the martyrs," said Raj Shroff. His friends who are young entrepreneurs in the city contributed Rs 15,000 to Rs 25 lakh (Rs 2.5 million) to this fund.
"We also wanted to send the message to those who save our lives that there are people who care for their families," said Shroff.
Housing Development Finance Company has become the custodian of the fund created by Shroff. HDFC is also working out plans to help the cause, Shroff said. Meanwhile, Luknow-based Sahara India group has promised to help the families of the martyrs by paying them five times the gross salary drawn by the policemen and NSG commandos for the next ten years.
