By: Triveni Rangarajan
When an art lover wanted her Van Gogh copy of ‘First Steps’ to go into good hands, she posted it on Swap!, a
WhatsApp group
, and it was snapped up in five minutes.
In at least 20,000 similar exchanges in the past three months conducted on the group’s 10 branches and with 25-30 posts every day, some 1,200 people who want to declutter and those who want to acquire are seeing the sense in exchanging household items, plants, homegrown veggies, homemade food items or items within the wardrobe.
Akshay Singh, Firdosh Roowalla,
Punam Dharkar
and Purnima Joshi from Kalyaninagar founded Swap! in April 2019 to encourage individuals towards decluttering through donation, exchange or sale of pre-owned household items.
“The spirit of giving through exchange (Swap!ping), donating or selling at nominal rates, pre-owned household items for reuse, is mutually satisfying both to the receiver and the giver,” says Singh.
Joshi said she helped some Korean teacups and a tea set change hands between two persons in Kalyaninagar. “Ujjwala Gokarn, the giver, was going minimalistic and was grateful that the objects she had bought in all her travels were finding a place with people who would cherish them equally,” she added.
The group’s philosophy is based on reuse, reduce and recycle for sustainable living. It involves new families that need household stuff, old families that want to give away theirs, community volunteers looking for good bargains, and others looking to buy pre-owned stuff. In the process, individuals make connections, share ideas, and special skills.
Kalyaninagar resident 11-year-old Vihaan got Rs 450 after selling his toys, books and puzzles on the platform. A woman exchanged fresh ‘papdi’ beans for an image of Mahalaxmi, another swapped Snapchat caps for some
ajwain
cuttings. A second year student acquired a violin posted for three months’ use on the group and joined music classes.
When a post about a laptop to be given away surfaced, Gauri Shinde, a cook, sought it for her 12-year-old son. Sachin Holkar, another member, reformatted the laptop and installed a basic software and handed it over to the boy.
Prathamesh Katkar from Baramati wanted an old UPS for his computer and got it through a donation from Sarbjit Singh.
At first, the founders brought items from home and traded them for other items within the community. Yard sales were organized in restaurants, garages, temple premises, and community centres. People discovered friends among their neighbours, got recipes and swapped ideas. More joined the quartet and a group of curators was formed.
Dharkar and Singh monitor all the posts closely to ensure that the group's guidelines and philosophy are followed. Roowala watches out for the objective of the group while Joshi encourages people to share interactions as Swap! Soul Stories.
The administrators disallow posts related to pets, vehicles, business posts and forwards. There can be no posts seeking funds even for NGOs, no promotion of NGOs except requests that help with decluttering homes. Requests for old clothes, newspapers, bedsheets, and mattresses can be posted, said Singh.
Members have to fill the details of the items in a format and be honest about repairs the items would need. “Sometimes, people miss out on the suggestion to serve the first person to respond which has led to a few disappointments,” Singh said.
The administrators said members are also vigilant and state their displeasure over wayward posts, Joshi added. A request to delete an unwanted post goes out quickly.
According to Dharkar, a probable threat is from copycats, where the philosophy and guidelines of Swap! may be followed unscrupulously.
Roowala agrees that an open source chat platform cannot have specific guards against duping. “But, we appeal to the goodness of people to keep the interactions honest and come across as people who are in service to others as the group is about building close-knit local communities,” he adds.
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