Investment in ULIPs Helps Achieve Goals When You Are Not Around

Mehul Ved, 34, remembers how a particularly rainy day in Mumbai led him into creating a communication and support system for those in need.

I remember that the rain was relentless on that day last year. I was talking to a friend on the phone and we wondered how we could contribute to help others in this kind of weather.

I'm a software engineer by profession and was familiar with a few hashtags that people were using such as #RainHosts, which was started by Jayakrishnan Nambiar, as well as #MumbaiRains. It struck me that if we could connect those stranded in a particular area with someone who was willing to host them, I could help out while sitting in front of a computer. And this was help that was very vital in a city like Mumbai.

Within a day, I was lucky to connect with a few like-minded folks. Karthik Balakrishnan helped set up the website, mumbairains.org; Dharmaraj Solanki collected important contacts which we uploaded on the website; Sandhya Ramesh and Sowmya Rao helped put up a list of essentials that were required for those who were stranded; Bhumil Haria, Aditya Sengupta and Gaurav Chaturvedi helped sort out the data. All of a sudden, we had a team in place.

We now set up a system where we could extract tweets from Twitter and sort them out to understand where people were stuck. Maintaining communication was essentially the key, besides the website which had vital numbers of emergency services as well as hosts. Besides, our team helped coordinate between the hosts and those who needed help. We also kept a check on the mobile network in each place to know if communications were in place.

Our aim was to ensure that people who needed help could get it as soon as possible. And quite incredibly, we set the whole thing up in a single day.

Strangely enough, the coming together of this project instilled a sense of responsibility, a sense that I need to prepare financially for the future of this project... Or for any future dream.

I now invest regularly to ensure I get returns on my savings, over and above the principal amount. Just like I invested in studying technology, which could make such a big difference on rainy days.

The efforts displayed by Mehul and others, along with many others in Mumbai during the rains, show us how people always look out for each other. Looking out for yourself and your loved ones involves planning your finances, and saving up for future requirements. Invest in ULIPs to help achieve these goals.

ARN: ED/08/19/15397