“I come from a very poor family and even having one meal a day was a burden. To add to this, we were impacted with severe floods in 1994 causing large-scale damage and several deaths. Fortunately, we survived the floods but all our property and harvests were destroyed. Overnight, we had to sell what little we had to leave our village in Nagpur and move to Nizamabad to find an alternative livelihood. I began working as a daily wager in hotels, construction sites, and even as a lorry cleaner when I was only 5 years old.

People say there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel. I found that light in the form of social reformer Shri. Hemalata Lavanam. She was the founder of Samskar Ashram Vidyalayam, an ashram that educates underprivileged children free of cost.

One day as I was working at a construction site as a child labourer, a volunteer from her Ashram spotted me and took me in. After my higher education, I worked in various odd jobs.

Once my financial situation had stabilized a little, I took up a job in a catering business. It was here that I saw the amount of food that gets wasted every day. When I had just moved to Hyderabad, I remember sleeping on the platform with not a morsel of food in my mouth and a rumbling belly. It was a painfully fresh memory and I knew I had to do everything I could to prevent other children from experiencing the same struggle.

It was this incentive that led me to start an NGO in 2012 named Don’t Waste Food. Along with my friends and volunteers, I would carry large gunny bags collecting the leftover food from around the hotels, marriage halls across India. We then distribute the food among the underprivileged ensuring the quality checks. What started as a small movement has now gained the momentum across the country.

When I look back and see what we have created now, I know that we are making a difference. That is all that matters, for one less child to go to sleep hungry at night.”