Institution

I Volunteer

When Aadhan shifted to hometown Chennai in February, after 10 years in the US, he brought with him not just knowledge of information systems but also a mindset geared to work for a social cause.

In Virginia, where he studied and later worked as a software developer, Aadhan volunteered at a children's library and, later, at the Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters there. On his return to India, he wanted to give something back to the community here as well, but didn't know where to begin.

He turned to Google for help and stumbled upon iVolunteer, a platform linking socially–conscious individuals with social organisations. “It was a relief to have a guide,” says Aadhan, who now spends about two hours on Saturday evenings with children at an orphanage, sharing thoughts or simply playing. “It's not about giving money, it's about giving time.”

iVolunteer aims to encourage people with skills to reach out, to think beyond ‘government’, to be the change in helping develop the nation. “The green revolution helped India stock up on food grains and the white revolution, on milk. Then came the IT revolution. We wanted to create a volunteering revolution to help build India,” says Rahul Nainwal, who together with Shalabh Sahai founded the charity in 2001.

The first steps: The idea for iVolunteer was sown during the two years Rahul and Shalabh were at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand. They realized that professionalising the social sector was the way to spur rural development. They also saw that with the right kind of set–up they could marshal volunteers for the effort.

A Web site was launched (www.ivolunteer.com) and a centre started in Delhi, followed by centres in Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore. The team approached NGOs and corporates to spread the word through meetings at professional clubs, seminars at colleges and schools, and word–of–mouth and other communication activities. The emphasis was on placing volunteers with skills that matched the needs of each NGO. “To provide real value it is important to work on projects that utilise your professional skills towards human objectives. The work should deliver at the end of the day. The volunteer should feel ‘I have added something’,” says Shalabh.

Heart for the heartlands: iVolunteer also has projects such as India Fellow, designed to take youngsters into rural heartlands to see for themselves the challenges in the development process. The six–week course was started as a pilot in 2005 in Delhi, with 17 volunteers chosen on a competitive basis from colleges.

The concept of seva is not new in the country's millennia–old history, explains Rahul. However, the defining moment for volunteerism was the Gandhian movement. Many were inspired by the call of Independence. Doctors and lawyers left paying jobs to work in rural areas. This could be taken to be the starting point of formal volunteering in India, he says.

iVolunteer specifically targets corporates in its Employee Volunteering programme, started in 2005, in an attempt to help companies fulfill social outreach goals. The process is slow and challenging, says Rahul. “There's a Corporate Social Responsibility system in place but nothing beyond. The attitude is: ‘I can give money and be done with it.’ And, ‘volunteering takes up company time’; there's a cost attached to it as it's a paid service,” says Shalabh.

Sanjay Mudnaney, Assistant General Manager, Corporate Communications at Mastek and Head, Mastek Foundation, agrees. “Companies stand to gain as volunteers create a social image about the company. Moreover, they learn leadership skills besides adding value to the self,” he says.

Caring corporates: He also points out that more and more employees in India Inc today are ‘uncomfortable’ seeing the discrepancies in the country's development process. “They are very much aware that they are the lucky ones who have much more than others. They really want to help,” he says.

The changes in iVolunteer itself amply reflect this phenomenon. The service organisation has grown from 30–40 volunteers in 2001 to about 5,000 now, 70 per cent of whom are working professionals. As many as 100–120 individuals are placed in the service sector every month through its four centres.

iVolunteer recently launched its India Fellow Professional Programme, seeking out volunteers among ‘MBAs with at least two years’ work experience to reach out to needy sections in rural areas.

To work around that, through November–December this year, iVolunteer is placing 10 employees in various s NGOs “to create case studies so that other organisations will come forward”.

iVolunteer can be contacted at
Chennai: (044) 42892791, 0–9841487984;
New Delhi: (011) 26217460, 65672160;
Bangalore: (080) 41466568;
Mumbai: (022) 26105235, 65828875.

Source: Sumithra Thangavelu. Let's help. Business Line, Chennai, 16 November 2007.