London-based charity sending clothes to pandemic-hit India

A charity in northwest London will be sending its third batch of clothes to pandemic-hit India very soon.

Lelung Dharma Trust, a London based charity with an outlet on Field End Road, Eastcote, has been playing an active role in donating clothes for needy people in India with some 800 kilos of clothes already being shipped last month.

Earlier, the charity had sent a shipment of 18 sacks of clothes (360 kilos) to the Tibetan Refugee Welfare Office (TRWO) in India.

The clothes being sent are intended to help people in India who have lost their jobs, livelihoods or homes or parents or the main earner of the family.

The consignment of clothes will also be used to provide relief to flood-hit people in Kangra Valley, near Dharamsala in the northern state of Himachal Pradesh. 

Lelung Dharma Trust has also raised over £87,000 in private donations this year that is being used to help Tibetan refugee communities in India caught up in the pandemic. 

The money is paying the wages temporarily for doctors and nurses to treat people with Covid, as well as paying for essential Covid vaccines and kits. The trust also funded a new ambulance for the Tibetan Cancer Society based in Delhi.

H.E. Lelung Tulku, founder and spiritual director of the Lelung Dharma Trust, said: “People should take pride that their wonderful donations of clothes to our shop are having such a life-enhancing impact on people in India who are facing great challenges right now.

“I am pleased we are able to help where there is such a pressing need for action. I thank all our donors and supporters for their continued help. I would also like to thank all our volunteers in London as well as Kunga Tsering and the Tibetan Refugee Welfare Office team in India for distributing the clothing to needy people.

Calling people to make more donations since this is an ongoing project, Tulku also asked people to volunteer to “help us sort and bag clothes" in the charity shop so that the charity can “send warm clothing to north India and summer clothing to south India”.