For a solitary physically-challenged 25-year-old Mumbai woman, Virali Modi, Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh had a pleasant surprise on Wednesday: curfew passes for her help and driver.
Virali’s predicament started after a national lockdown was imposed since Tuesday which prevented her driver and help to reach her home in Malad west where she lives alone.
On the verge of panic, she decided to take matters into her own hands and communicate directly with Deshmukh.
“I am disabled and I live alone. I need my maid who cooks and does other physiological care for me. Due to the virus, she won’t be able to come. What do we do about these situations?” Virali asked the minister in a tweet.
Deshmukh immediately asked his aides to alert the local police station of the woman’s plight and Police Inspector George Fernandes reached there with a team.
Virali was surprised to see the police team — at her doorstep within 25 minutes of her tweet — inquiring about her health status and well-being.
Fernandes assured her that arrangements would be made to facilitate curfew passes for her driver and help to enable them to travel to her home and back.
“While we are in the midst of an unprecedented health crisis, we cannot forget the human side to the problems. The state government will help anyone who reaches out to us,” Deshmukh said, appreciating Insp. Fernandes’ promptness in dealing with the issue.
On her part, Virali was all praise for the police and government for assisting her for her personal crises in the times of the unprecedented coronavirus pandemic emergency.