Distressed after watching Nepal videos, UP boy gives his piggy bank for flood relief

On Thursday, an eight-year-old boy walked up to the district magistrate of Bahraich carrying a gulak – a small earthen piggy bank – he had lovingly filled with coins and cash over the past year. Alfaz Sheikh, a Class III student, asked that it be sent, just as it was, all the way to Nepal, to help people whose lives had been upended by the recent flash floods.

Officials are now working out a way to honour the boy’s wish and ensure his gift reaches its destination intact, coins and all. Bahraich, a district in Uttar Pradesh sharing its border with Nepal, saw 14 unidentified bodies – believed to be flood victims – being swept down the Gandak River from Nepal into India.

After conducting postmortems and preserving DNA samples, the district administration handed the bodies over to Nepali authorities. But amid this solemn exchange, a small act of a child’s kindness found itself caught in bureaucratic limbo.

Sources said that when officials tried to hand over Alfaz’s gulak along with the bodies, Nepali authorities reportedly declined to accept it, asking instead that the money be deposited directly into a bank account. Now, officials are exploring another route – reaching out to the Nepal Embassy with a request to ensure that Alfaz’s gulak, exactly as he had given it, finally makes its way to the flood-affected people of Nepal.

“District Magistrate Mahender Singh Tawar has directed that the gulak be sent to the Nepal Embassy, so it can reach Nepal along with other relief items. It represents a child’s own savings – a small gesture of solidarity from him – and every effort is being made to ensure it reaches the Embassy intact,” an official said.

Speaking to The Indian Express over the phone, the child said: “Mujhe accha nahi laga mobile par video dekh kar, log pareshan hain Nepal mein baad aane par. Humney apney baba se kaha hum apna paisa dena chahte hain pareshan logo ko, toh unhone kaha theek hai aur humne de diya (I felt bad watching videos on the mobile – people are suffering in Nepal because of the floods.

I told my grandfather I wanted to give my money to the people in trouble, and he said okay, so we gave it).” Alfaz, a resident of Betiya village in Kushinagar, is the third of four children born to Imran Siddiqui, who works in Riyadh, and Nusrat Parveen.

“Alfaz wanted to give away the savings he had collected in his gulak over the past year to the flood victims. These were coins and small notes he had received from elders over time — we believe there must be around Rs 2,000 in there.

When I told his father about it, he said that if Alfaz wished to do this, we should find a way to send it to Nepal,” said his grandfather Qasim Ali. The family first reached out to local residents to figure out the best way to send the money to Nepal, before deciding it would be simplest to hand the gulak over to the district magistrate.

“Alfaz handed over his gulak to the district magistrate and requested that it be sent to Nepal, as his own small contribution towards helping the people there,” added Qasim Ali.