Allahabad City continued to shiver under a prolonged cold spell and the night temperature kept dipping to near freezing point. There was countless number of people struggling through the night with little scope for survival in the open. Fr James Francis, Fr Archibald D’Silva and Fr Deepak D'Souza thought that something out to be done without delay. By the evening of the 8th of January there were 501 new blankets ready for distribution, procured with the generosity of many people. Fr Louis Mascarenhas, Fr Anand John K V, Fr Vincent Pereira and Fr Francis Xavier J volunteered to join us in the distribution which would take place after 11:15 at night.

Huddling in twos and threes under torn blankets, pieces of cardboard or plastic wrapping and crouching near the embers of a burnt-out fire was a city of homeless men, women and children. Though only a part of Civil Lines could be covered, the group of seven had to return at 1.30 a.m. after the stock of blankets ran out. The newspapers showed that the temperature had dipped to - 0.3 (0.3 degrees below freezing) at night when the blankets were being distributed. The gratitude in their unspoken words and their urgency to use the blanket told us that we were on the right track. 

The blankets were distributed to every homeless person along the roads marked in BLACK in Allahabad Civil Lines and surrounding areas.