Saylani Welfare Trust

Saylani Welfare International Trust (Pakistan)
FoundedMay 1999
FounderMaulana Bashir Farooq Qadri
FocusEmergency services, food to homeless, education, healthcare, ambulance services
Location
Area served
Social Welfare, Humanitarianism
MethodDonations and grants
Employees20000
Websitesaylaniwelfare.com

Saylani Welfare International Trust is a non-government organization (NGO) focusing primarily on feeding the poor and homeless. It was established in May 1999 and is headquartered at Bahdurabad, Karachi, Pakistan.[1]

It was founded and headed by spiritual and religious scholar Maulana Bashir Farooq Qadri.[2][3] With an estimated monthly expenditure of Pakistani Rupees above 30 million, Saylani Trust provides food twice a day to more than 30,000 poor people through its 100 centers (generally known as Dastar-Khawan), most of them are serving in Karachi.[4][5] The organization distributed CNG rickshaws among the jobless citizens of Karachi in April 2011 with the help of members of the Karachi business community.[6]

Services provided

Medical institutions of Saylani

With its offices in Nottingham, UK, Saylani Welfare raises funds, as well as raising awareness of a range of charity projects. Services by Saylani (NGO) are provided free of cost. It offers the following medical services at the following facilities:[1]

  • (i) Saylani Chest Care Center, provides services to patients suffering from Tuberculosis
  • (ii) Saylani Diabetic Center, giving services to diabetic patients with facilities for the treatment of Hepatitis "C"

Charitable initiatives

Saylani, since its inception, has worked on both providing needed economic and nutritional help to the needy in distress as well as providing means for able-bodied persons to earn a living through innovative solutions to "tackle the root causes and effects of poverty of Pakistani citizens." This ranges anywhere from programs similar to those provided by Social Security in Western nations to doing area to area and neighborhood to neighborhood searches of the needy and providing relief.[7] Notable among these programs are:

Roti Bank

The Roti Bank provides free meals to needy families in a simple walk-up kiosk along a main thoroughfare in Karachi. After providing their identification, details of family size (via birth certificates) and getting the Saylani "Free Food Card", the families can get 2 meals per day for a month.[8][9] The initiative was launched on 14 August 2018.[10]

Economic empowerment

In 2013, in an effort to create economic empowerment via training in Technology, especially Web and Mobile App development, Saylani Welfare International Trust began its Saylani Mass IT Training (SMIT) Program under the guidance of Zia Ullah Khan,[11] who have previously run successful mass IT programs like “Operation Badar”.[12]  The goal of SMIT was to create 10,000 well-trained Web and Mobile App developers in emerging programming languages like React, Node JS, and Angular JS.[13] The program thus far has trained 4,000 developers successfully in fields as varied as Cisco’s CCNA certification, Graphic Design, and Startup Entrepreneurship along with the Web and Mobile App development skills to spur economic empowerment and  allow its graduates to quickly become economically independent.[14]

Aid to Syrian and Rohingya refugees

In 2017, Saylani Welfare Trust confirmed that they were providing food aid to Syrian refugees on Turkey's border with Syria. The Chief Operating Officer of Saylani, Muhammad Ghazal, said that they are working in partnership with the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) to provide aid to Syrian living in refugee camps near the border.[15]

Saylani Welfare Trust also provides aid to Rohingya living in refugee camps in Bangladesh.[16]

COVID-19 crisis

During the COVID-19 crisis, Saylani Welfare Trust provided free oxygen, food, rescue equipment and other supplies to hospitals and Covid-19 wards in the country.[17] It also introduced mobile phone application and telephone service, where needy families can register themselves to get ration and other essential items.[18]

On 13 April 2020, reports emerged that rations were being denied to minority Hindus and Christians in the coastal areas of Karachi by Saylani Welfare workers.[19] On 14 April 2020, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) expressed concern regarding the reports about discrimination against the minorities in Karachi. Following the reports about Hindus and Christians in some parts of Karachi being denied food aid, other organisations such as the Edhi Foundation, JDC Welfare Organization and Jamaat-e-Islami stepped forward to provide rations to the minorities in those areas.[19]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Saylani Welfare International Trust. PakistanHerald.com. 4 August 2021
  2. ^ Correspondent (20 January 2015). "For clean drinking water: Saylani Welfare plans to install 63 RO plants in the city". Express tribune. Retrieved 22 March 2015. {{cite web}}: |author= has generic name (help)
  3. ^ Chaudhry, Javed (14 March 2014). "Ye hain Asal Musalman (These are true Muslims)" (in Urdu). Karachi, Pakistan: Daily Express Urdu.
  4. ^ Shahab Nafees/Ali Haider (22 July 2014). "Quantum jump in donations to charities". The Daily Dawn. Retrieved 22 March 2015.
  5. ^ "Visiting the Saylani Welfare Trust in Karachi". The Daily Dawn. 6 June 2013. Retrieved 16 May 2023.
  6. ^ Abdul Ahad (24 April 2011). "Saylani distributes CNG rickshaws among jobless". Business Recorder. Retrieved 22 March 2015.
  7. ^ Mughal, Mohammad Ali (13 April 2020). "Live video of distribution of ration". Facebook.
  8. ^ Aslam, Haroon. "Roti Bank Provides Free Meals to the Underprivileged in Karachi". Retrieved 2 May 2020.
  9. ^ Tribune.com.pk (20 November 2017). "Roti Bank: Taking from the rich and giving to the poor". The Express Tribune. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
  10. ^ "The Roti Bank—Karachi". Research Snipers. 20 November 2017. Archived from the original on 26 September 2020. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
  11. ^ "University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF)". uaf.edu.pk. Retrieved 10 January 2023.
  12. ^ "About". Operation Badar. 31 December 2010. Retrieved 2 September 2019.
  13. ^ "IT training: 6,500 candidates appear in entrance exam". Business Recorder. 20 November 2017. Retrieved 2 September 2019.
  14. ^ "'No solution to child labour possible without appreciating ground realities'". www.thenews.com.pk. Retrieved 2 September 2019.
  15. ^ Hufsa Chaudhry. Saylani Welfare Trust serves Syrian refugees at Turkish border. Dawn News. 8 February 2017.
  16. ^ A people’s resilience. The News. 19 December 2018.
  17. ^ Aamir Khan.Welfare organisations redirect Covid efforts. Express Tribune. 27 December 2020.
  18. ^ Aamir Latif. Pakistan's charities assist in fight against coronavirus. Anadolu Agency. 26 March 2020.
  19. ^ a b USCIRF says ‘troubled’ by denial of food to Pakistani Hindus, Christians amid Covid-19 crisis. Hindustan Times. 14 April 2020. archived from 14 April 2020.