A year after the Iranian youth introduced the Wall of Kindness, or Deewar-e-Meherbani – as it is known in Persian and Urdu languages – the social welfare concept has transcended across the border into Pakistani cities.
The walls display used clothes, shoes and other superfluous or no longer required dresses or items that the needy, destitute or homeless people may come and take with them for their use. The walls with dresses hanging from hooks fixed in the walls against colorful background are visible in almost every big city of Pakistan – providing an opportunity to the philanthropic and the middle class people to share their extra things with fellow beings.
The first Deewar-e-Mehrebani appeared in Peshawar, the northwestern city known for its ancient heritage and religious culture, followed by one in Lahore’s upscale Gulberg locality. This wall was created by students of Punjab University.
Now, the culture of walls of kindness, and at some places the wall of needs or Deewar-e-Zaroorat, has reached the port city of Karachi in Sindh and southwestern Balochistan province’s capital Quetta.
Pakistan has an expanding middle class of around 50 million people – mainly in the prosperous areas of Punjab – but still millions living below poverty line can hardly afford to buy new clothes every season.
“If adopted across the country, it would be a source of relief for the people who otherwise are unable to buy new or even used items or clothes,” Dr. Qais Aslam, an economist, says.
The wall of kindness may be a charity initiative in its spirit but it is a simple act of sharing and caring. The people, who want to help others, just bring the stuff, like a used jacket, shirt, shawl – very much in demand in winters – or even packed food items, and hang them on these walls. The underprivileged or the needy take what they need for free and use them. This way the poor don’t have to beg for charity and do not feel marginalized.
The idea of Deewar-e-Mehrebani was introduced by a group of Iranian young citizens in Teheran and Mashad initially but soon its spread across the country, which is now coming out of international isolation after sealing a nuclear deal with the United States and major powers.
As the initiative got media coverage, the “social safety project” gained appreciation in the electronic and print publications. The Pakistani and Chinese youth groups were quick to embrace the idea, with college and university students taking the lead in the creation of walls of kindness.
These youth generally belong to lower middle class, who are motivated to serve the poor masses but don’t have enough resources to achieve the objective on their own. The concept of wall of kindness has provided a rallying point for the young men and women to contribute to this end.
An appealing and inclusive feature of the idea is that this has no religious or cultural strings attached to it – anyone can contribute, anyone can take away.
The broadening outreach of the concept, in effect, helps fill disconnects in the social safety networks or systems. Despite success of some projects, the federal or provincial governments do not assign resources and focus to the social well being of all the underprivileged individuals or groups. Analysts say in this scenario this non-governmental initiative is going to work wonders in developing countries.
This project will help meet the needs of the people living below the poverty line who form about one third of country’s 190 million people, says Dr. Aslam.
This apparently small step may collectively help mitigate difficulties of distressed communities in a basic way.
