#2016 - #Newbeginnings

Is it that time of the year again?
For reflections of the months gone by,
Where masking the tears, were the smiles aplenty.
A cuss under the breath and the avalanche of intolerance spilled, and
In the dark of the night rising cries of pity. No. Anger, into the pillow.
Resolve for an affirmation of change,
Beginning from me - the fingers pointing at me no longer.
When thought out resolutions are copious, assuring life anew,
A time for hope they say; that numerology may help!

Plans to meet who, when and where - the Marina or perhaps the Corniche?
For pretty dresses to impress - He likes the color blue, he said.

But, 'Sorry we don't have an open slot Ma'am'

The polish has a smudge and there is no repair,
The blue one isn't showing my cleavage enough,
The beauty spot needs to show - the red one is short too,
My eyes trace the slit and the red reflection smiles.

The sea of yellow and red is growing bigger.
Oh, I wish they would hurry!
But will I be able to focus on me
The regime of Yoga. No, he said Zumba!
And no whites; for how long would that be?
And the phone is ringing and I do not hear.

I am late, as always he says.

Be good - And who is saying that?

I should have worn blue!

And us...
Is that a light?

==========

Shades of the new year at Carter Road Bandra last evening with massive crowds of people took to the roads with friends, kids, elders and family were an interesting first time experience for me. People of all kinds Indian and foreign; tiny and huge; modern and conservative; young and old hugged, smiled, laughed, Selfied, lit crackers, wore caps and red illuminated horns and let go of balloons and floating lanterns into the dark sky singing Happy New Year ... it was a time for cheer.

At the traffic signal was an efficient cop on duty directing traffic. I extended my hand out at him saying 'Happy New Year Sir'. He smiled and gave out and then on second thoughts pulled back his hand. smiled and said 'Happy New Year Maam' and went on with his job at hand ;)

The Mantra of Empowering Young

Recently Rekha and Inderjit Sharma, 75+ year old senior citizens of Mumbai, India had a manifestation of their continued efforts towards empowering young girls - daughters of a rickshaw driver, or a vegetable seller, or perhaps a cobbler or cleaner; where their education is the least priority and restriction is norm.

It is to such girls that they provide support by encouraging them to continue their studies, teaching them to communicate in the world language 'English' and alongside facilitating them with the skill of sewing garments for children and women using sewing machines and fabric donated by friends and family. 

The year long effort of sewing and coaching concluded by facilitating them with a platform to experience public interaction. This was made possible on two occasions - The first being at the annual exhibition of the Dilkhush Center at Juhu where they set up stalls of fun games like 'blow in the cork' and 'how steady is your hand' - both the games were made by the children and taught them to apply their learning of physics. Needless to say that the experience of trying to blow the cork in and keeping the hand steady while carefully taking the wired loop across the twisted band to avoid touching it and sparking the beep brought a load of delight for the challengers - collecting the coupons and donating the same to the school taught the children how to give without expecting anything in return.

The second interaction was at the School of Life at Andheri Versova Link Road where the sewed garments were first displayed on hangers with price tags, the team was taught how to respond to queries about the garments, complete the transaction, packing and finally taking feedback. 

The simple objective of this exercise was to empower the young girls with the confidence to interact in society, acquire a skill that they can use to earn a livelihood and learn the intricacies of what it takes to create a home grown venture.

The result was heartening as most of the garments flew off the hangers thanks to the enthusiastic visitors who encouraged the girls for their efforts and hard work. 

The smiles on their young and hopeful faces when the exhibition came to a close were priceless; while for Rekha and Inderjit their minds were busy making plans of how to fulfill new dreams in the new year.

Social Entrepreneur - Can you be one?

Entrepreneurship normally is a form of work that people with leadership qualities easily take to, and if the leader is inspiring and has an incredible idea or innovation that makes life better, he or she naturally attract followers to believe in their passion and co-create wealth for stakeholders. Now imagine a leader that has a passion to create wealth with a social mission as its epicenter – a mission that is viable while effecting change, that is inclusive of people living at the fringes of society and that can reach out to people across the globe; a business leader of such an enterprise is called a social entrepreneur.

They both create opportunities – but there is a difference. The regular entrepreneur thinks only of his enterprise and donates in retrospect while the social entrepreneur thinks of how his enterprise can change the lives of people by empowering them to be a part of the change.

Years ago, I had the privilege of working on OASIS (Old Age Social Income Security) a project initiated by a small company called Invest India Economic Foundation, under the aegis of the Ministry of Social Justice – we endeavored to develop a pensions framework for retired people of India by encouraging them to systematically save money into a professionally managed pension scheme during their work lives so that they can continue to live with dignity in their golden years – our team led by Gautam Bhardwaj worked tirelessly and passionately initiating research papers, conducting conferences, meeting stock market experts, insurance and mutual fund heads, government officials and bureaucrats for several years; more often than not having cost over-runs - the result of that project is the recently launched New Pension Scheme.

Around the same time I got acquainted with the phenomenal work of Mohammad Yunus, the economist from Bangladesh, who created the unique ideology of micro-finance and formed the Grameen Bank, which helped the poorest of the poor to break out of poverty by providing loans to entrepreneurs who could not qualify for regular bank credit – loans were given in solidarity groups that ensured repayment.

In the United States; Leilah Jenah started the Sama Source, which works effectively to uplift communities across the globe - they simply understood the billions-of-dollars-worth business process outsourcing model and turned it into an enterprise that used technology to get thousands of poor people to be part of projects and gave money straight into their hands. Goodwill Industries popularly associated with charity, employs marginalized people, recycles donated clothing and helps corporations with doing their events and managing their relocation - they earn store revenues amounting to $3 billion.

Closer home the SEWA Bank formed by Elaben Bhatt works successfully with poor women with the mantra that they are 'bankable' as they are economically active; and not to be forgotten is Dr. Verghese Kurien’s white revolution gave livelihood to millions making India one of the world’s largest producers of milk and made Amul a household name.

All the examples mentioned above are successful social entrepreneurship stories led by great minds that kept their mission of effecting change in societies as their epicenter.

Among the many global problems, poverty is one that leads to personal misery and frustration. Poverty is the result of lack of opportunity to make a livelihood for loved ones. 'An idle mind is a devils workshop' is an old adage that has never been more meaningful in today's times than before, as all of us belong to the global village with connectivity and awareness of what we can have and can't because of or the lack of, our financial capacities. This stark reality of the poor is more in our face today and yes we feel guilt but don't take time out to empathise because we are too busy with our personal endeavours to do better, thereby widening the divide between the haves and the have not's. This divide aids angst against the better endowed and often results in crime and unrest. Social entrepreneurship today seeks to provide occupation to those educated but idle minds, thus reducing the divide and being an essential ingredient to pave the way for global peace.

What further aids social entrepreneurs’ today is the new but popular ideology called impact sourcing, which is sourcing based on social impact and quality. Procurement Managers from corporations have the option to choose the partners they wish to work with through the year for their business related needs and are also are conscious of the companies corporate social responsibility #CSR targets. There is a growing trend to consciously work with organisations that have an explicit social mission. By choosing to work with such enterprises they ensure that their allocated budget is actually being used to address issues like poverty alleviation. This way of reaching out to people and aiding their lives is far more effective and real than donating money to an NGO at the end of the year or hoping that a fraction of the tax one pays is collected by the government and appropriately disbursed to improve the lives of the needy.

#socialentrepreneurship is one of the important keys that can make each one of us have a meaningful role to play and feel the responsibility of making our world a truly global village and us a truly global family.