TVS Motor Company, a manufacturer of two- and three-wheelers, and die-caster Sundaram-Clayton Ltd (SCL) have pledged ₹30 crore to support the nationwide efforts to curb the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus.

The funding will come through Srinivasan Services Trust (SST), the social arm of TVS Motor Company and Sundaram-Clayton Ltd, and will include measures ranging from manufacturing and supplying supportive equipment such as masks and providing cooked meals to those on the frontline -- from healthcare workers to police officers.

“This is an unprecedented crisis that requires all of us to cooperate and support each other as a nation,” said Venu Srinivasan, Chairman of TVS Motor Company. “Our priority is to help government efforts to contain and mitigate the effects of this pandemic. We will continue to do what we can for the community and people, as we have done in our 100-year history.”

Under the first phase, SST has supplied 10 tractors fitted with disinfectant sprays and about 30 personnel to the Hosur Municipal Corporation in Tamil Nadu, and municipalities in Krishnagiri and Mysuru. The streets and villages in and around these towns are being sprayed with disinfectants.

SST will also manufacture and distribute 1 million face masks.

TVS Motor Company and SCL are using canteen kitchens in Hosur, Padi (Chennai) and Mysuru to get food cooked, and it is being distributed to police, healthcare workers and essential services workers in and around Hosur, Chennai and Mysuru. In Baddi, Himachal Pradesh, the company is distributing dry ration kits to daily wage workers who have been displaced, and also to villagers who need food supplies, every day.

In addition, the two companies are evaluating collaborations with 3D printing companies to make ventilators that will help support hospitals that lack the necessary life-support systems to treat Covid-19 patients.

TVS Motor Company and Sundaram-Clayton Ltd. have shut all their offices and manufacturing facilities in line with government guidelines.