Salt Lake: A group of senior citizens has been pooling money and collecting donations from various blocks in Salt Lake to distribute food packets to migrant workers and the needy.

The group includes mostly retired professionals, including doctors and teachers. On Sunday, they handed over masks, soaps and packets of rice, atta and potatoes to labourers, van-pullers and cooks of fast-food stalls that are now closed.

The recipients are mostly from other states.

The group had raised funds over the past few weeks and started the distribution drive from the community centre in FE Block in the afternoon.

Apart from collecting donations, the group has engaged several people who live abroad, Basab Basak, a group member, said.

One of the group members had pointed out most labourers and van-pullers who could not return to their hometowns, Basak said. “We decided to help these workers as they now have limited resources and can’t go back…. Now they are without jobs and money.”

More than 60 men and women received packets, each of which had 2kg rice, atta and potatoes, apart from two packets of soya beans and a bar of soap.

The Bidhannagar commissionerate's airport division gave sanitary napkins to more than 200 women who live in slums in Kaikhali, Teghoria and close to the airport.