WGF Outreach Meet Edison, NJ – 30th April 2024

An informative gathering of PanIIT NJ members supporting WHEELS mission was held in NJ on 30th April 2024 at 6:30 pm. (Watch the Recording of the Session here.)

The gathering had a sizable audience of IITians as well as non-IITians, including physicians and technology professionals from other institutes. WHEELS president, Ratan Agarwal, gave an overview of WGF’s history, its goals, a brief description of various WGF projects and their impact on the ground. He highlighted the Newborn Nutrition project in Madhya Pradesh for which WGF recently received a large grant from the RIST foundation that will have an impact on a sizable number of newborns in the 1^st phase of the project. On successful completion, it has the potential to be scaled to impact over 10 Million lives.

Next, Dr. Sarika Kulkarni, cofounder of Mumbai-based Raah Foundation presented her work in improving the lives of the indigenous tribal communities in the western ghats of Sahyadri mountain range, Maharashtra.

The audience learned of Raah’s amazing work in several areas:

♦ Their innovative model focuses on the reforestation of large tracts of land in the Sahyadri mountain range providing the farmers with the saplings to enable reforestation and some cash income in the process

♦ Expanding the initial work from 50 acres to more than 1000 acres with a vision to reach 50,000 acres

♦ Restoration of the water bodies containing basalt rocks which requires a more innovative model as the water washes away faster

♦ The livelihood program where the rural youth is trained on a 4-week business skills program with a job guarantee. Already more than 1000 youths are trained;

♦ A 4-month manufacturing skills course designed for girls with guaranteed jobs

It took the foundation almost 10 years to reach INR 1 Cr annual revenue and gain credibility to partner with various companies wanting to distribute CSR funds.

The audience was inspired to share their intent to join the mission.

Watch the Recording of the Session here.