Today we were visited by a van load of individuals blaring music over a public address system soliciting donations for the treatment of a child in Ponda. Sometime back during the monsoons also, this was done with the variant that tickets for a tiatr were being sold for a similar charity.
What was annoying was the insistence and hard sell tactics of the collectors. They made it a point to tell us that it was announced in Church and hence we were obliged to give to the charity. The same thing had happened earlier. Using this means, how many of our poor villagers have been induced to part with their hard earned money I wonder? This raises a few questions in my skeptical mind. Why the insistence and why the hard sell? Normally, when donations are sought for, say a heart, operation, an appeal signed by a doctor is generally published in the newspapers and a bank account number is given. Could this high pressure sales gimmick be the work of an agency which has contracted to collect the money on a commission basis? If the price of petrol alone from Ponda to Moira by Maruti van is considered (@ Rs. 45 +, plus three or four persons expenditure meals, snacks, etc) these 'collectors' could have benefited the charity considerably by simply donating the amount rather than by this expensive method of collection. I suspect something fishy here. -- тσηу ============================ Tony de Sa Ph: +91 832 2470 148 M: +91 9975162897 E: tonydesa at gmail dot com ----------------------------------------------------------- Things do not change; we change. - Henry David Thoreau ================================
