Many people just throw their old clothes away as they move up to the latest fashion. They might want to donate, but the problem is how to find people who need such clothes? To solve this, Hyderabad based charitable organizations have initiated a ‘Clothes Bank’ in the city. The basic objective of this bank is to collect clothes from people who no longer need them, and distribute those clothes to the poor and the needy.

The initiative, a first of its kind in Hyderabad, was inaugurated on April 29 and started doling out clothes from May 02. This clothes bank in Hyderabad is on similar lines with the ‘Kapda Bank’ in Maharashtra’s Aurangabad, started by an NGO in January which also runs a ‘Roti Bank.’

The initiative where people can ‘deposit’ clothes to help those cannot afford to buy some for themselves, is a joint effort between the Siasat Urdu Daily and city-based charitable organizations Faiz-e-Aam Trust and Helping Hand.

They plan to have clothes and footwear for men, women and children, which the lesser privileged can avail for free. So far, they have managed to raise as many as 10,000 pairs of clothes apart from footwear and toys.

All clothes are examined for wear, tear, missing buttons before they are given in transparent plastic bags to the beneficiaries. “People can come here and just take clothes and footwear as per their requirement,” Zahid Ali Khan, one of the persons behind the initiative said.

Initially, requests only from women will be entertained at the ‘Kapda Bank.’ The women can take clothes for men as well, organizers said. Activists associated with the programme said that there will no discrimination based on race or religion.

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The Clothes Bank is a simple yet impactful idea and we hope this serves as an inspiration to many of us to take up such initiatives.