Actor Shilpa Shetty took to Instagram on Monday and requested fans to donate to an organisation that is doing work in fighting hunger. She mentioned how she was 'not okay' amid the Covid-19 second wave gloom.

In a video she shared, Shilpa said: "I usually share information to motivate you to stay fit and healthy but today even I need Monday motivation and a lot of it because I am not okay. And I can't be, none of us are. We are experiencing this inexplicable pain, from all that is happening around us, and we are all expressing it very differently."

She added: "We are not just losing people to Covid, but we are also losing people to hunger, to the lack of oxygen, to the lack of timely medical care."

At one point, Shilpa nearly choked as she spoke of people who had lost their loved one in the second wave of this pandemic. She also thanked all the frontline workers - police, healthcare workers, BMC workers etc - who were at the forefront of dealing with this crisis.

"I would also like to make an appeal to join forces and channelise all our energies towards helping those who need us at this point. While I have my own charitable trust, I am honest, ashamed but brave enough to say that there are people who have much more gumption and bigger hearts than me, who are personally doing the job of feeding these people who need their help. Yes, it did make me feel very small but my thought was 'what can I do?' So the least we can do in these times is play a catalyst," she said.
She then spoke of an organisation called Khaana Chahiye, which is involved in feeding people. She asked her fans to donate liberally in a link she shared and also requested her fellow industry folks to join this initiative or any other 'they deem fit'.

She ended the video with the request to all her fans to mask up, maintain social distancing and go in for vaccinations if they were eligible for it.

(With inputs from agencies)