Accidents are horrible and sadly, a tragic one that took place on 4 November at a Novena construction site took the life of a 28-year-old migrant worker, Muthaiyan Velmurugan.
Details About Velmurugan’s Life
While the identity of the victim was previously unknown, a local ground-up initiative called It’s Raining Raincoats (IRR) worked hard to find out more about the victim so that they would be able to reach out to his family and offer assistance.
The IRR then posted on Facebook about the victim to share details about the victim’s life, hoping to raise money for his family.
The victim, Velmurugan, has been working here in Singapore for the past five and a half years and had just returned to Singapore after visiting his home in India two months ago.
In India, he has a wife whom he married one and a half years ago, and she is currently expecting their first child.
Velmurugan had apparently found out the news that his wife was expecting just a few days before the accident.
In the Facebook post, IRR then went on to describe the accident and the pain that Velmurugan must have felt before reaching out and asking people to donate money to help Velmurugan’s family via a fundraising drive.
$158,000 was raised
The IRR Facebook post soon went viral with many netizens sharing the post and donating to show support to Velmurugan’s family.
In the end, a total of 2,623 people donated $158,398 which will be sent back to Velmurugan’s family in India.
IRR
Channel News Asia later interviewed the founder of IRR, Dipa Swaminathan, to find out her thoughts on the situation.
Swaminathan then said that two volunteers had also left white packets to be given to Velmurugan’s cousin, who was also a migrant worker here but is back in India to bring Velmurugan’s body back home.
To end off, Swaminathan acknowledged the efforts of netizens who donated for the cause but said “our real goal, more than money, was that we didn’t want him to be another statistic. We wanted everyone to know his name and story”.
Hopefully, more will be done to ensure that accidents like this are prevented in the future. Rest in peace, Velmurugan and condolences to his family.
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