Florine Roche

Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru

Mangaluru, Sep 29 : Even a square meal a day is often a luxury to most of the poor, sick, the exploited and the needy in our country. In the face of this grave reality there are a few good Samaritans whose humanitarian concern and helping hand is making a difference to the lives of the sick, abandoned and the underprivileged.

In Mangalore, every evening, it is a common sight to see people waiting enthusiastically for their meal in the city’s bus and railway stations, outside hospitals and other places as NGO White Doves offers them free food irrespective of caste, creed, sex and religion. White Doves has been practising this routine for the last 18 years and about 150 people are fed nutritious meals every day. . Needless to say this service has been treated as a great blessing to the underprivileged, destitute and migrants.

For Corrine the oft-repeated phrase ‘service to humanity is service to God’ is not just a cliché but a routine reality. Apart from feeding the hungry she runs two destitute homes - one at Matadakani and the other in Jail Road in the city providing food, shelter, clothing and medical help to over 132 inmates. Both these are temporary shelters provided free of charge by good Samaritans, that which needs to be returned back to them, eventually.

The inmates of these homes constitute abandoned, the sick, the destitute and physically and mentally challenged children, women and men picked up from the streets of Dakshina Kannada in most grimy, exploited and abused conditions starving and living in most inhuman conditions.

The central part of her very existence, for Corrine Rasquinha, founder of the NGO White Doves, is humanitarian service and concern for the destitute. Being actively involved in the field of serving the deprived sections of the society, this indefatigable fighter and courageous cancer survivor has now gone a step ahead and is setting up a Psychiatric Nursing And Destitute Home in Maroli, Mangalore, to provide shelter to the rescued.

The Foundation Stone for this 200- bed nursing home project was laid by the Bishop of Mangalore Diocese in February this year and the construction is going on at a rapid pace.

White Doves is one of the very few NGOs authorised by the District administration to provide psychiatric care to its inmates under the Mental Act of 1987.

Psychological Counselling for Traumatised Souls

The White Doves Psychiatric Nursing And Destitute Home is a Rs. 7.5 crore project comprising of basement floor, ground floor plus two floors and will be the first of its kind of psychiatric nursing home in Mangalore.

Corrine was frantically searching for a suitable plot for the last two years and her prayers were heard by the Bishop of Mangalore Diocese Dr Aloysius Paul D Souza who magnanimously leased out 49 cents of land for this noble cause at Maroli. As a result Corrine has been able to move forward with her plans without any further delay. Corrine says the project will be completed by December 2017 and she is hopeful of getting generous help from like-minded people who want to serve the society in their own little way.

Setting up this psychiatric nursing home is very vital to facilitate recovery of the rescued people and the district administration of Mangalore has given license to White Doves to set up this psychiatric home.

Providing psychiatric treatment forms a vital part of the recovery process of these destitute says Corrine. “These people come from different backgrounds and are found in pitiable conditions with wounds on their bodies and stench oozing out of them. They are physically and emotionally traumatised as a result of deprivation of care, love, affection, warmth, security and acceptance. Psychiatric treatment and counselling forms the most essential part of their path to recovery and hence this exclusive nursing home is imperative” Corrine explains.

Corrine Rasquinha

In addition to caring and providing the inmates with life’s basic needs White Doves has always strived to reunite the destitute with their families, whichever part of the country they may belong to and has succeeded in this mission. So far it has successfully reunited about 80 people after ensuring their total recovery. A few inmates of White Doves are pursuing their education and are studying in various educational institutions in the city.

An appeal for helping hands

Although White Doves is an NGO running entirely on the goodwill of donors so far, Corrine says she never felt the crunch of resources at any point in time because somehow ‘everything falls in place in the nick of time’. She has 11 staff to take care of the needs of the inmates and also for providing free meals. She says that though she never approached people for donations they have been generous and she never had difficulty in running these destitute homes. Since the last year, with the help of MLA J  R Lobo, White Doves has been able to get some monetary help from the government for the upkeep of the inmates and staff.

Now the time has come for the White Doves to seek generous Donations from willing citizens to complete Corrine’s dream project – The Psychiatric Nursing & Destitute Home. Since the budget is quite huge, White Doves has decided to seek the help in her efforts to have a permanent shelter for White Doves inmates present and future.

As the present homes are temporary and are located at two different places there are many technical problems to be faced on a routine basis. The cooking for both homes is done in one place and therefore food has to be transported from one place to another regularly. Even managing two homes separately becomes a tiresome job as coordinating between two centres located apart is quite tedious. Having a permanent place of its own will put an end to these problems once and for all.

White Doves has been Registered as a trust in the year 2001 wherein Corrine is the Founder President. However, she wants to ensure that the work of White Doves continues unabated. To ensure this White Doves has entered into an agreement with Betharram Fathers who have vowed to continue the long journey of service to humanity started by Corrine.

Generous Donations from willing citizens of this country would go a long way in helping people who really need our compassionate approach and willing help.

Donations to White Doves would get Income Tax Exemptions under U/S 80 G of the Income Tax Act 1961.

It is our bounden duty to join hands with White Doves to repay to society in our own little way and help the needy to provide them with basics of life. Here is the golden opportunity to help the society in whatever little way you can. Lend a helping hand to serve humanity and to serve God.

Bank details:

WHITE DOVES BANK DETAILS - BUILDING FUND A/C
Bank: HDFC Bank Ltd
Branch: MANGALORE - KARNATAKA
Address:M N Towers, Kadri, Mangalore-575002
Account Name: WHITE DOVES
A/c No: 50100127382631
RTGS/NEFT IFSC: HDFC0000094 MICR: 575240002

Corrine: 0091 - 9880517078
Jerome - 0091 - 9845607615 

Email: whitedovesmangalore@hotmail.com

Website: Click here