CANACONA
The 74th house built under the Shram-Dham initiative was handed over to a widow and her son by the Balram Charitable Trust led by Tribal Welfare Minister and Canacona MLA Ramesh Tawadkar on Wednesday.
Kesar Gaonkar and her son, Kishen, had earlier been living in a small one-room thatched hut at Amone ward of Poinguinim village. The Balram Charitable Trust took up the task to build a respectable residential unit for them four months ago.
According to Tribal Welfare Minister and Balram Charitable Trust Chairman Ramesh Tawadkar, the Shram-Dham "warriors" joined by some residents and assisted by close relatives of the Gaonkar family built and completed the house in a record two months.
The house, which has a verandah, hall, bedroom and kitchen, has been built on 70 sqare metres of land and designed by Shram-Dham engineer Vinay Tubki. The surrounding houses extended full cooperation to Shram-Dham warriors to build the house.
Tawadkar cut a ribbon and handed over the key to the house to Kesar Gaonkar and her son, Kishen, to mark the house entry (Gharpravesh) in the presence of Poinguinim Sarpanch Savita Tawadkar, Engineer Vinay Tubki and several other Balram Charitable Trust trustees.
“Constructing Shram-Dham houses is a prime example of humanity, brotherhood and the legacy of community living, taking forward the noble deed of helping each other,” said Tawadkar.
“While four other Shram-Dham houses are nearing completion within a few months, we are closely working on our ambitious plan to lay foundation stones for 100 Shram-Dham houses on a single day sometime after the monsoon ends,” the minister added.
