Benefit to feed the hungry surpasses its fundraising goal

Chicago IL: The Chicago Chapter of Akshaya Patra Foundation held its annual fundraiser on April 27th, 2013 at Intercontinental O’Hare, 5300 N. River Road, Rosemont, IL and received overwhelming community support for its great cause.

Hunger is a problem that over 50 million children are battling silently in India. It keeps these children out of school and forces them to take menial jobs to bring home food for their families. Hunger also impedes their ability to learn.

The Akshaya Patra Foundation is one of the world’s largest NGO which runs school meal programs serving over 1.3 million children daily in over 9,000 schools from 19 kitchens in nine states in India. A public-private partnership, Akshaya Patra combines good management, innovative technology and smart engineering to deliver school lunches at a fraction of the cost of similar programs in other parts of the world. The Akshaya Patra Foundation was recently ranked 23rd of the Top 100 NGOs in the World in The Global Journal’s 2013 annual ranking. The Global Journal also ranked Akshaya Patra 1st in the world for NGOs working to improve the lives of children and youth. Akshaya Patra’s mission is to simultaneously address childhood hunger and malnutrition and to promote education for underserved children in India.

The Akshaya Patra foundation is the world’s largest non-governmental organization that feeds children. It is committed to two major goals; eradication of hunger and the promotion of education. This is reflected in Akshaya Patra’s vision of “No child shall be deprived of education because of hunger.” AP encourages children to obtain an education by providing hearty, nutritious meals during the school year. This enables children to get at least one nutritious meal a day – often the only meal of the day for these impoverished children, and allows them to stay focused on learning. By targeting hunger and illiteracy, the organization hopes to break the cycle of poverty.

This event was chaired by Ms. Parminder Sawhney along with her team members Jasneet Edke, Lubaina Raj, Neha Patodia, Ragini Shekhawat, Anu Aggarwal and Tanu Singh who worked hard to ensure the success of this event.

MC of the program was Prof: RobWolcott from Kellog School of Business. In his welcome speech Ms. Sawhney urged everyone to get involved and provide a chance to change the lives of underprivileged children in India.

Dr. Gururaj “Desh” Deshpande, Chairman and Interim CEO of Akshaya Patra Foundation USA gave a complete overview of the organization right from its inception to its current operation in 9 states of India. He mentioned the tremendous impact this program has made in encouraging children to attend school and improving student performance and health.

The guest speaker at this event was Dr. Sunil Kumar, Dean of Chicago Booth School of Business. Dr. Sunil Kumar addressing the gathering said how “Akshaya Patra” appeals to his heart and his head as the program not only serves deprived children a healthy meal but it also minimizes cost, labor and time by utilizing innovative technology and local resources. He appreciated the amazing work accomplished by this NGO in India.

Special dignitary who graced this benefit was Dr. Sam Pitroda who serves as Chairman of India’s National Knowledge Commission and is a key leader in modernizing India’s telecommunications infrastructure. He is Chairman of World-Tel Limited, and founder and CEO of C-Sam Inc. He has served as an advisor to the United Nations and is widely sought-out as a lecturer on issues of business management, governance, and telecommunications. Dr. Pitroda remarked that Akshaya Patra is an excellent public/private partnership model benefiting a large number of children in India. He added that the Govt. of India is not equipped to solve all the problems facing the country, unless NGO’s like Akshaya Patra take an active role to address the needs. Through technology, innovation, management, entrepreneurship and business skills, Akshaya Patra has excelled in delivering a great service to the country and meeting the needs of hungry children. He pointed out the progress made in India in the field of communication and health care. He is confident that we shall see enormous National Development in the next two decades as the youth are charged to make a difference and build a strong country.

Following his speech, Ashley Singh gave an admirable music performance singing “Tumhi Ho Bandhu “. After dinner, there was a video presentation on Akshaya Patra ‘s work in India showing the kitchens where
mid-day meals are prepared for school children and the process involved in doing this.

A live auction was conducted where several donated items were sold to the highest bidder. Pledges were made to support schools where meals are delivered amounting to $150,000.

A beautiful bollywood dance number was performed by Infinity dancers – Anika Gupta, Shivani Shah, Pooja Venkit, Ravisha Saini, Radhika Patel, and Jasmine Merchant.

Vote of Thanks was given by event chair, Paraminder Sawhney, who thanked EXL Services, BCT Tech, CRTI, Option Monster, who were the event sponsors and Tanishq, (delete Anu and Arjun Aggarwal’s name) Sahil, Titan and Chicago Bears who were the Auction Sponsors.

The event hosted over 200 attendees from the Chicagoland and provided a vast array of information regarding the achievements, goals and future aspirations of the Akshaya Patra USA Foundation.