Businessman helps victims in Nepal rebuild lives

VOLUNTARY AID: Rotorua's Pandeep Singh Banwait (left) with Nand Lal Giri, who received a temporary shelter after he was made homeless from the April 25, Nepal earthquake. PHOTO/SUPPLIED

A Rotorua businessman is in Nepal helping people rebuild their homes and lives.

Pardeep Singh Banwait, director of Fruit Monster, flew into Kathmandu on Monday on a trip funded by the generosity of family, friends and the local Sikh community.

The April 25 earthquake killed 7000 people and injured twice as many.

With his wife and two young children remaining at home, he said he flew to Nepal as it was a Sikh community principle of "helping people in need".

Mr Banwait said he did not go as part of an aid organisation but chose to help people himself instead of giving to charities. He also took with him 12kg of medical supplies.

"I can say now, it was the best decision," Mr Banwait said.

Staying with a local doctor who trained in medicine with his cousin, Mr Banwait has helped residents in central Kathmandu who were most impacted by the quake. He said they were still experiencing aftershocks.

"We helped 165 people with temporary shelter so far whose houses have been completely knocked down or partially damaged. They could come down any moment with the after-effects, there's at least two or three each day.

"Through my local friend, I have been able to contact businesses and bought temporary shelters, we hired a truck and loaded it and were able to hand them out through the village areas," Mr Banwait said. "Their living conditions are pretty dire here - they've strung up tarpaulins or bed sheets between two wooden poles and sleep under that," he said.

"The Government has given out to families 12.5kg of rice, one bottle of oil and some salt to last them for 14 days.

"People are so thankful that people from other cultures have come to help them, especially in the villages. Already between 700,000 and 1 million people have fled Kathmandu and returned to their own villages after the quake."

Mr Banwait will leave Kathmandu and travel to the Gorkah and Pokhara areas where 28 people in one village were killed. He will return home to Rotorua next Sunday.