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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nPopularly known as \u2018Bobby ji\u2019, Sarbjeet Singh has been working to uplift and serve the underprivileged people of Himachal Pradesh for years. At a time when even paid drivers were not keen on doing it, this good samaritan volunteered to drive dead body van free of cost for the poor. For the last 10 years, he has also been organising blood donation camps for hospitals, and a couple of years ago, he has started a free canteen for cancer patients and their attendants at Shimla\u2019s only cancer hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here is the heartwarming story of this hardworking man, who has shown what one inspired individual can achieve when he, or she, sets his\/her mind to do it.<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Unlike most people, who are pre-occupied with their own lives and responsibilities, Sarbjeet Singh spends so much time in social work that the people who know him affectionately call him \u2018Vela Bobby\u2019 \u2013 \u2018vela\u2019 in Punjabi means someone who does nothing and thus has a lot of time on his hands!Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cPeople in Shimla call me Vela Bobby. Even my mother does the same! It doesn\u2019t offend me. Instead I am thankful that the almighty made me \u2018vela\u2019 so that I could spend my time in the service of humanity,\u201d says the man who has made selfless service the mission of his life.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
Talking about his experiences in an exclusive interview to TBI, Singh explains how his journey as a dedicated social worker began.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt all started twelve years back when I used to volunteer with the local gurudwara and help them organise blood donation camps. Over time, the gurudwara gradually stopped organising blood donation camps. However, I decided to continue organising camps on my own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Shimla, being the capital of Himachal, is where people from all over the state came for treatment. As a result, there is always a shortage of blood in Shimla\u2019s main hospitals \u2013 Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC) and Kamala Nehru hospital. So, I knew that I had to continue organising these blood donation camps.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sarabjeet Singh has been organising blood donation camps every Sunday for over 11 years now and has collected over 20,000 units of blood for Shimla\u2019s hospitals. All the blood banks in the state have his phone number and know they can rely on him in case of an emergency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the past eight years, Singh has also been running a free 24\u00d77 funeral van service to help the dead in their final journey, be it night or day. He has never refused a call, even at odd hours, to transport a dead body to the cremation ground if the vehicle is with him. He has even transported badly decomposed bodies, lying unclaimed at the hospital mortuaries, for the last rites by the Shimla Municipal Corporation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Explaining that the idea came to him when he saw that even government-run hospitals lacked this facility, Singh says,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBack then, cremation and burial grounds used to be pretty far from the hospitals which had no vehicle for transporting dead bodies. As a result, many families used to find it difficult to transport the dead bodies for their last rites. Also, after 5 pm, the people were helpless as there was no facility in town to help them do this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since I also like driving, I decided to lend a helping hand by driving a funeral van (run by the local Guru Nanak Sewa Society) to ferry bodies 24 x 7 and free of cost. In 2012, with help from citizens, I bought my own crowdfunded van for the free service. Till date, I have ferried more than 5,000 bodies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While it is a macabre job, the experiences I have had while driving the funeral van have taught me many things. I still remember the time when I ferried a 9-year old girl\u2019s body to her distraught mother\u2019s home. It was the first time I had truly realised the importance of my job and it just strengthened my resolve to continue my service. I felt perhaps God himself had given me this duty. Soon after, I started my NGO, Almighty Blessings. \u201c<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2014, under the banner of his NGO, Almighty Blessings, Sarbjeet Singh started a free canteen for poor patients and their attendants at Shimla\u2019s only cancer hospital. He says, \u201cI realised that people from all over the state, some from really remote places, visited this cancer hospital and it didn\u2019t even have a canteen to serve them! Some of them are so poor that they can\u2019t even afford medicines for the treatment, let alone food. That\u2019s when I decided to do something about this.Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The free canteen I opened started out by offering tea and biscuits for free to patients and their attendants. I wanted to ensure that everyone of them at least got a cup of hot tea in the cold mornings of Shimla. Today, I am very happy to say that the canteen now serves tea, biscuits, soup, daliya<\/em> and dal-chawal <\/em>for free to the patients and their attendants every day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Source: http:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/2022\/04\/08\/from-driving-the-funeral-van-to-feeding-cancer-patients-shimlas-vela-bobby-does-it-all-for-free\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An urge to serve the society pushed Sarbjeet Singh\u00a0to set up a free canteen for cancer patients, drive a free funeral van for the poor and organize regular blood donation camps to help Shimla\u2019s hospitals. Popularly known as \u2018Bobby ji\u2019, Sarbjeet Singh has been working to uplift and serve the underprivileged people of Himachal Pradesh for years. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":192,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180\/revisions\/192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associationthankyou.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}