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Mothers in vivid saris standing behind rows of children wrapped in newly distributed grey blankets, clotheslines and winter trees behind them.RAAHAT ▪ 2026
WINTER DRIVE · FEB 2026

We spent a February morning at a brick kiln, before the cold does what it does.

Migrant families fire bricks through the winter and live along the stacks. We brought blankets and warm clothes before the cold set in.

Drive
Project Raahat
Where
Brick-kiln settlements, Delhi-NCR
When
February 2026
What we brought
Winter kits
The stakes, in numbers

Last winter 474 homeless people died in Delhi across 56 days for want of a blanket and shelter, a count by the Centre for Holistic Development that the National Human Rights Commission took formal cognisance of.

Source · NHRC · winter 2024–25

Raahat works the brick-kiln settlements on the city's edge, where the families who fire the bricks also live: single rooms and half-built shelter set along the stacks. Most are seasonal migrants, in for the firing season and gone again when the heat returns.

We got there in the morning, while the ground was still cold. The children came first, because the cold reaches them first.

What we carried in
  • Blankets
  • Winter jackets and hoodies, child and adult sizes
  • Woollen caps and socks
The morning, in frames
Volunteer helping a small child pull on a new hoodie — the most candid working moment in the setIMPACT ▪ 2022
A volunteer works a new hoodie down over a small child's arms: the most ordinary moment of the morning, and the reason to be there.
The whole brick-kiln community gathered with volunteers, the kiln chimney and a big open sky behind them.IMPACT ▪ 2022
The whole settlement gathered by the kiln chimney for the morning's drive.
Children in new winter hoodies beside the PAS banner, golden hour at the settlementIMPACT ▪ 2022
Children in their new hoodies at golden hour, the Pledge A Smile banner behind them.
Sacks of ration grain and cartons stacked against a classroom blackboard, staged before a distribution.RAAHAT ▪ COVID ERA · 2020–21
Blankets going out at the kiln, children and volunteers gathered before the smokestack.
Why we ran it

We go out to the kiln rather than wait for anyone to come to us, because the people most exposed to the cold are the ones least likely to be counted. The 2011 Census put Delhi's homeless at 46,724; civil-society head-counts since have argued the real figure is many times that.

A blanket does not fix any of that. It gets one family through one night that would otherwise have been dangerous. On a winter like this one, that is the whole job.

See Project Raahat Read the next report

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winter drive.

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GIVEDonate₹300 to ₹2,500 turns into rations, school kits and winter warmth on the next drive.Donate now