Real life super heroes don’t wear capes.

They just live amongst us and continue their herculean efforts in the service of nature and all its inhabitants while never looking for any recognition or reward for their efforts.

Their only desire is to see happiness and satisfaction in the eyes of the ones whom they serve.

We see that amongst the many who continuously and regularly prepare Langars in Gurudwaras or serve as volunteers in various food kitchens and respect their efforts.

But one of the toughest and most heartbreaking job is to serve the little muted children of a lesser God from the animal and bird kingdom on the streets, especially in countries like India where there are practically no shelters available for their upkeep.

And where lately even the current government and judiciary has turned against them in making laws and passing judgments to not just make life difficult for these children but also harass and intimidate a group of silent feeders and citizens who serve these children.

And yet we can never give up and this fight to save, protect and love our stray dogs, cats, birds, raccoons, skunks on the streets will continue for this lifetime and beyond.

One of my main jobs in India was to connect with such superheroes and see how we can develop their decades long individual efforts into a ground level organization which will survive the test of time.

Today I wish to introduce to this group three super heroes from Mumbai-

Ms Lydia Dias- a teacher who through her personal efforts is feeding close to 250 strays daily in the Andheri/Bandra area.

Mr Royce Patel who besides feeding innumerable strays on the streets of Mumbai, also brings the injured or the orphaned to his own home and tries to get new homes for them. And if no one comes forward, he feeds and takes care of them IN HIS SMALL CONDO HIMSELF. At the last count as he told today, he had 27 dogs and cats in his condo living with him and giving him company, all strays picked up from the streets.

And he and Ms Dias have been doing this day in, day out for decades.

And then there is Kevin who feeds and serves strays in the Nalasopara area and I have personally seen that he and his team members have literally picked up heavily injured children from the streets who are left to die and brought them back to life.

I do not believe in God but if there was/is one then I did meet God or his angels today and will cherish this day for life.

And also hope that the step that we have taken today to join hands and convert these individual efforts into a strong collective, can bear fruit.

I will be serving these heroes as their small backend support and will be traveling between Canada and India to do whatever we can to build on this.

If anyone wishes to come forward to help in any which way, in India, Canada or from any part of the world, please do let know.

Thank you Ms Dias, Royce and Kevin for who you are and what you do.

And may your tribe increase!