With every step he takes, 4-year-old Gopal looks longingly at the door in the hope that his mother will walk in anytime and cuddle him in her arms.
The little boy from Mathura, India, has been waiting for that day for over six months, little realising that his mother is no more.
In another corner, Kanhaiyalal, a barber by profession and now a paraplegic, just can’t stop talking about his days when he owned a salon in the small town of Behror in Rajasthan, where he had four people employed under him.
Peek into every city, town or village in India and you will find many poor people who are sick, disabled, suffering and deserted by family and society.
They include old people no one wants to look after; orphans and abandoned babies because they are born out of wedlock; and the sick who are left to their fate.
Meet the couple
But there is a couple which cares. Dr B.M. Bhardwaj and his wife, Dr Madhuri Bhardwaj, care enough to provide such needy people shelter, food and medical care free of cost. And they do it with love and dedication.
The two have set up an NGO, Maa Madhuri Brij Vaaris Seva Sadan, and run Apna Ghar — a charity home for the abandoned, in Bajhera village, around 50 kilometres from Agra in Uttar Pradesh.
At present, the doctor couple and a team of 14 dedicated members who form the core of this NGO take care of 118 people.
Their mission is to attend to every abandoned person they find. There are 70 women, 40 men and eight children living in Apna Ghar.
Every month, around 10 to 15 sick people are admitted to Apna Ghar and almost an equal number who are cured leave the home to resume normal life.
The majority of these people suffer from mental ailments but there are also those suffering from Aids, cancer and other diseases.
Mutual decision
The Bhardwajs, who hail from Aligarh, decided early in their marriage to not have children of their own and serve the helpless and abandoned by setting up a charity home.
“There are so many children in this world who have no one to take care of them. So we decided that instead of having our own children, we would devote our love and attention to sick people and abandoned and orphaned children,” says Dr Bhardwaj, as he holds 2-year-old Ankit in his arms, a boy who lost his mother a few months ago and is now a member of Apna Ghar.
When they started, the biggest challenge for the couple was to establish credibility. “When we talked to potential investors, they were not convinced about the project.
"They thought we were setting up an NGO to collect funds and once we had collected the charity, we would vanish with the money,” Dr Bhardwaj says.
So the two put together all their earnings, sold the little jewellery they had and managed the initial investment to build their dream home, which cost them around Rs1.45 million (Dh113,411) in 2000.
Eight years hence, things have changed. After seeing the response to Apna Ghar and the dedication of the couple, more and more hands are coming together to serve their cause.
Apna Ghar not only provides medical care but also focuses on activities of daily living such as toilet training, brushing teeth, washing, getting dressed and nutrition.
A room is shared by two people and every patient has his or her own bed. The inmates are served hygienic and nutritious food.
Tough gets going
In the first few years, financially, the going was very tough but things are easing up now. The cost of running the establishment is around Rs400,000 (Dh31,258) a month and a large part of that comes from donations.
Today Apna Ghar boasts around 4,000 donors and membership can be obtained by paying as little as Rs20 (Dh1.5) a month.
“We have deliberately kept the membership fees low so that anyone who wants to help can do so by paying just Rs20 a month. Now things have eased up, though we are just about breaking even,” Dr Bhardwaj says.
But lack of funds has never deterred this doctor couple from extending a helping hand to the diseased and the helpless.
In the past eight years, they have treated over 1,400 people and their aim is to have an Apna Ghar in every part of the country, so that no sick and abandoned person is left unattended and unloved.
