Thanks to Dien for today’s shout-out at Asian American Giving – where she lists 11 Asian-American philanthropy bloggers, including The South Asian Philanthropy Project! (Only 11, you ask? I was surprised too.)
Seeing all the other bloggers’ Twitter feeds nudges me toward getting back on @ArchanaSAPP, despite my hesitation from the first go-around.
I’m particularly interested to read the musings of two relatively new bloggers on the list: Paul’s Blog at Bachwriter and Global Grassroots Giving.
Many of you may know that the South Asian Philanthropy Project conducts regular interviews with South Asian philanthropists and nonprofit leaders across North America – to collect their stories and to enlist their advice about how SAPP should have an impact. We are hoping to analyze these interviews and make our findings available to all of you eventually.
Aditya Jha
Today I had a wonderful conversation with Aditya Jha, prominent Canadian philanthropist. Originally from India, Aditya focuses his philanthropy on education, entrepreneurship, and aboriginal communities in Canada. He has founded the POA Educational Foundation, which makes grants in these areas and works to raise the profile of these issues in Canada.
As we’ve discussed before at this blog, South Asian giving in North America is often for religious or educational causes. I was initially interested in Aditya’s philanthropic giving because of how non-traditional it seemed for an Indo-Canadian to focus so intently on financial support for aboriginal causes in Canada.
I highly recommend the foundation’s website and some of Aditya’s speeches about philanthropy and his personal giving philosophy. While Aditya shared a great deal of wisdom in our conversation, one theme was of particular interest to me – the importance of giving locally in one’s home country and community. Here are some excerpts from a September 2007 speech that touches on this theme (emphasis mine):
- Be active with the cause that you give to – where you are actively involved with your money, time and talent and to a cause that you are passionate about there will be multi-fold impact than the paternalistic mode of giving where you just cut a cheque. Your presence and involvement allows stringent control, oversight and the cause benefits immensely from your insight that you have accumulated by virtue of being so successful.
- Philanthropy of affluence has given rise to a new business, that is, Business of Philanthropy, which in many cases leads to wastage akin to running large bureaucratic type of organizations and in the long run, harms the cause of philanthropy…
- Before I become active with ‘giving’, I looked at giving as charity to others. Now, I see giving as charity to myself. You are giving to your expanded self, your passion, your talent to make change and to your obligation to payback to the favorite social circumstances so that those circumstances are sustainable for yourself, your kids and for all, that you care about…
- Last but not least, I would like to make a case that we should support mainstream Canadian philanthropic projects in a major way, and international projects as well as Indian projects with a lesser portion of our total giving. Most of the successful Indo-Canadian professionals and entrepreneurs here have done relatively better than those who have been in Canada for generations. We have become successful by delivering mainstream services to the mainstream people. Then why should our giving be mainly to ethnic causes? There could be the logic, that Canada is a rich country; but let’s look at the plight of the unfortunates in Canada, and the need of philanthropic dollars to support our universities, hospitals, opera, museums, environmental causes, etc.
Read this article on Nazar Online. Check it out!
“The Association for India’s Development is offering qualified students an opportunity to intern at a non-profit educational institution supporting children from a slum in Mumbai, India. This institution is called Parivartan, and provides informal education to children in slums across Mumbai. The activities of interns will include teaching arts & crafts, coaching the students in music & drama, generating awareness via blogs and social media, organizing excursions for students, and more.”
Deadline for the application is December, 29th!
- P
(c/o NYTimes.com)
Of course we wouldn’t be a good South Asian blog if we didn’t at least mention the Obamas’ first state dinner in honor of India last night. Here was a nice quote from the President’s toast:
Mr. Prime Minister, today we worked to fulfill our duty –bring our countries closer together than ever before. Tonight, under the stars, we celebrate the spirit that will sustain our partnership — the bonds of friendship between our people.
It’s a bond that includes more than two million Indian Americans who enrich every corner of our great nation — leaders in government, science, industry and the arts — some of whom join us tonight.
A nice reminder about the philanthropic power of our 2 million+ South Asians in the U.S. At the dinner, there were many celebrities, Indian-American leaders, and political players among the guests – surely some philanthropists among them as well!
Suja Thomas
We always love news about new philanthropy blogs, especially when they’re run by law-types like ourselves. In this spirit, check out The Give Blog: Conscious Living and Giving, launched this week by Illinois law prof Suja Thomas and her husband Scott Bahr.
And, in honor of their launch, they’re matching your gifts up to $100 to five selected charities! Go take a look…
(Hat tip to Anil and the Faculty Lounge.)
Here at SAPP, we’ve spent some time talking about board service at charitable organizations – for example, at the SAALT Summit here. We’ve also talked about religious giving and how this is one of the main areas of charitable giving among South Asians in North America – for example, from Ramya here.
(c/o Globe and Mail)
Well, here’s a story that brings those two threads together – and from my new home country of Canada! The Globe & Mail reported last week on the front page that Gursimran Kaur, a 19-year-old Canadian Sikh, and a slate of 18 other young Sikhs (mostly in their 30’s) won a contentious election to board leadership at the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara temple in Surrey, B.C., one of North America’s largest Sikh temples.
A few interesting things… The youth candidates ran on a platform of returning to traditional Sikh customs at the temple, plus a focus on women’s rights and youth programs. I thought it was intriguing that the young candidates committed to a more traditional agenda – while at the same time raising “progressive” issues such as women’s rights and combating domestic violence and youth gang activity.
As far as the areas they’ve identified for the gurdwara to take an active role, these include: programs to combat drug use and gang violence; workshops on Sikh scripture and rituals in English to appeal to the younger generation; new community services programs at the temple; a safe-house for women; and, workshops on violence against women and on women’s rights.
I will be curious to see how the young slate of directors does on the job – Will fundraising go up? Will the group use new technologies to raise money and volunteers? Will more young people be inspired to get involved?
Suresh and Sudhakar Shenoy
1. U.S. Congressman Gerald E. Connolly honored brothers Sudhakar V. Shenoy and Suresh V. Shenoy of northern Virginia, founders of tech company IMC, for their philanthropic efforts. The Shenoys are community leaders through volunteer and philanthropic activities with the American Heart Association, Youth Aids, the American Cancer Society, United Way, the American-India Foundation, the National Capital Region American Red Cross, and the IIT Heritage Foundation.
2. The Simon School of Business at the University of Rochester received a $1.5 million gift from the Wadhawan family of India to establish an endowed professorship in management for a scholar focused on India. The press release says, “The gift is the first of its kind from an Indian family to a top-tier U.S. business school.”
(Hat Tip once again to Dien!)
Do you want to use your skills to help NGOs in the developing world innovate and solve global programs? Check out the annual call for applications from the Deshpande Foundation – the Sandbox Fellows program application is up now and the Innovators program is coming soon.
And for you legal scholars out there, the Drexel Law Review has put out a call for papers for an upcoming symposium edition on Law and South Asia.
(Hat tip to Asian American Giving and Anil.)
Nikhil Arora and Alejandro Valez are two young entrepreneurs in San Francisco that came up with one interesting business idea. In a business ethics course, Arora and Valez learned of the use of coffee grounds in the production of mushrooms. The two teamed up with Berkeley’s ecology department and received a $5000 social innovation grant. They quickly achieved their goal and began taste testing their home grown mushrooms. Arora and Valez eventually established BTTR Ventures (pronounced “better” ventures and stands for “back to the roots”). BTTR Ventures reuses coffee grounds from Pete’s Coffee and is a no-waste business that donates left over coffee grounds to local parks in San Francisco. For more information, check out this article in South Asian Journal Association Forum.
What do you all think about business ventures with social good dimensions? Can we call these new models “philanthropy” or are they something different?
Happy Philanthropy Day! Falling on Sunday this year, November 15th is celebrated annually as National Philanthropy Day, a chance for charities and donors to come together and focus on giving. Here’s an excerpt from the official website, put together by the Association of Fundraising Professionals:
National Philanthropy Day®, November 15, is the special day set aside to recognize and pay tribute to the great contributions that philanthropy—and those people active in the philanthropic community—have made to our lives, our communities and our world. This year marks the 24th anniversary of this special day.
Why do we celebrate philanthropy? Consider the impact of the charitable sector and the increasing role it plays in our societies and countries around the world. Billions of dollars given every year. Millions of programs and services. Connecting individuals to causes, and to each other. Fostering civic participation. Improving the quality of life for all people.
In the United States alone, there are more than 1 million charitable organizations, and Americans give more than $300 billion annually to charitable causes (Giving USA Foundation). In Canada, more than 88,000 charities provide countless services to millions of Canadians, who in turn contribute more than $10 billion annually to those organizations (Canada Revenue Agency). In Latin America and Asia, with governments no longer able to provide enough funding for social services, charitable sectors are growing rapidly and creating programs to meet the needs of their countries’ citizens. The quality of life for all people—everything from education, healthcare, the environment and the arts, to name only a few—would be far less if not for these organizations.
I opened my Globe and Mail today to find a special section on philanthropy, with some great articles on nonprofit boards and tax proposals for charitable giving in Canada. And the New York Times’ special section on Giving came out yesterday.
Let us know what you’ll be doing for National Philanthropy Day!
