Print

Comment

Email

Digg

Del.icio.us

Reddit

Twitter

The age old adage charity begins at home is perhaps best exemplified by Narayana Murthy, chairman and chief mentor Infosys. Through Infosys Foundation and other initiatives, this tech bellwether has always been on the forefront of philanthropic activities as part of its corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Murthy firmly underlines the significance of CSR: For benefits of globalization and technology to reach the poor, the private sector, philanthropic institutions and committed individuals should cooperate and establish partnerships with government institutions. This would lift millions of our people out of poverty, provide them with opportunities and make them participate in the process and progress of globalization, .

Referred to as a companys soul food, CSR is a voluntary exercise undertaken by business enterprises including taking positive steps regarding its resources, skills, location and funds for the benefit of people and environment. While Murthy and Infy have been proactive on the CSR front, how do other tech companies, both MNCs and Indians, stack up?

The sad part is that CSR still has not taken off in India according to a recent survey by Mumbai based online organization Karmayog. The second edition of the survey has revealed startling facts: nearly half of the top 1,000 Indian companies surveyed do nothing by way of corporate social responsibility. Karmayogs suggestion was that every company must spend a minimum of 0.2% of its sales on CSR and make a mention of it in the annual report.

For the Indian IT industry, whatever CSR activities are happening are centered around education, rural upliftment and helping the physically challenged. Dataquest attempts to track down some of the CSR initiative which the major IT companies have undertaken.

Education for All
All children deserve to have access to knowledge and the digital divide can be a big barrier for them to be successful in a knowledge based economy. Not surprisingly, education has become a key focus area for the Indian government with the 11th Five year plan earmarking Rs 5,000 crore for setting up IT infrastructure in government schools.

It is imperative that students across India are allowed to develop skills essential to compete in a globally competitive world. And with more than 80% of the schools in India being government schools, corporate India too has joined hands with the government for undertaking serious efforts focused on enhancing the quality of education in this space.

Taking a cue, a majority of IT companies in India are now assisting the underprivileged children to prepare for mainstream education by equipping them with skills required to compete in a global world.

Tech Mahindra runs Prayasa project for providing community based alternative primary education for empowerment of out-of-school marginalized children in Delhis urban slums. Under the project, the Tech Mahindra Foundation is supporting seven additional alternative education centers, which provide education to 280 children. These centers are located in areas where the children lack parental support or parents are not in a position to afford remedial coaching through commercial coaching centers.

Another Indian IT company, Polaris, too has been running a unique program called Ullas for over a decade now, for recognizing academic excellence in students from corporation and government schools between classes nine and twelve, by providing not just monetary assistance but also sharpening social skills. Beginning with just thirty-two children, Ullas has awarded over 20,000 scholarships to students in schools across all districts of Tamil Nadu, Mumbai and Delhi, says K Govindarajan, senior VP and head, administration and special projects, Polaris.

Like Dell globally, Polaris too has decided to contribute 1% of the companys profits to the Ullas Trust. In the last fiscal, 3,313 students were awarded young achiever scholarships representing 196 schools in Chennai, 150 schools from all districts of Tamil Nadu. What makes the project unique is that the initiative is anchored by the employees of Polaris, who contribute 40% of the scholarship amount, while Polaris contributes the remaining 60%, adds Govindarajan.

Wipro meanwhile has partnered with thirty-two organizations. In 2008 alone, the company worked on thirty-five projects in partnership with twenty-seven organizations, and was mainly involved in providing infrastructure for marginalized children at Kasturba Gurukulam (working with girl child) and Vanavil (with nomadic children).

HP India has undertaken the Sankya Plus Education program in partnership with Rotary International District. A virtual network to connect schools, teachers and children, HP India has awarded a grant of Rs 60 lakh for setting up a HP-Rotary hub that will connect numerous government and unaided schools.

This knowledge center will facilitate the dissemination of information to over 500 schools in the first phase by utilizing the existing computer networkby creating pre-recorded virtual classroom sessions. The project will also identify and deploy laboratory simulation packages that will either compensate for the lack of good laboratory infrastructure in many schools or supplement existing infrastructure in others.

Aricent India has adopted the Carterpuri Primary school (Gurgaon) for providing basic and advanced training in computers to its 500 students by setting up computer labs, and monetary contribution for infrastructure upgradation and other essentials like uniforms, school bags, books, mid-day snacks, etc.

A similar initiative is being run at the Damodaran School in Chennai for the underprivileged children with Aricent contributing by way of school shoes, stationary material and an audio CD player along with educational CDs. Considering that a majority of children at a school-going age are school dropouts, Aricent is working in collaboration with Gurgaon based Literacy India for the upliftment of such destitute children, illiterate women and unemployed youth by providing their premises to impart computer training to the vocational training students.

As one of the most well-known active players in Indias education segment, Intel India has been working in the upliftment of school education partnering with state governments and national bodies for education like National Council for Teacher Education in a PPP mode. Through its Intel Teach program, 8,64,000 teachers across seventeen states have benefited. Its other program, Intel Learn, intended to enable learners to acquire technology skills has benefited more than 50,000 students in Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas and Akshay centers in Kerala.

Even as companies continue to work for improvising education, Cisco has taken the onus to feed the millions of impoverished children across the globe through its Harvest of Hope program. In India the company has worked with Akshaya Patra, feeding 7,500 government school going children mid-day meals around its new campus. By using matching funds from Cisco Foundation and John Morgridge Foundation, we were able to fund our CSR partner for around 7,500 children.

There are however exceptions to the MNCs preference to go it alone with companies like Cognizant, Microsoft and IBM India choosing to rely on the know-how of NGOs when it comes to running CSR initiatives.

Cognizant has been working with Pune based Swatantryaveer Sawarkar Educational Trust since 2007 to build a residential learning center for rural children in a remote village called Dabhon catering to the needs of the children of the areas Katkari tribals, most of whom are migratory and cannot provide uninterrupted education to their children.

Under Ullas program, Polaris has awarded over 20,000 scholarships to students in TN, Mumbai, and Delhi

Microsoft Indias ambitious project, Jyoti, involves working with NGOs to empower underserved individuals through the use of IT skills training. Under the project, the company has announced grants worth Rs 7.63 crore for three NGOs with an aim to touch 100,000 individuals across nineteen states over a period of three years.

The three NGOs include Aide et Action (Rs 4.56 crore) to help train 54,000 youth across eighty-two centers in order to equip them to find jobs in new economy sectors like ITeS, retail and customer relations; CAP Foundation (Rs 1.20 crore) to scale up employability training for 36,000 people through e-learning modules delivered over the Internet; and Mahila SEWA Trust (Rs 1.87 crore) for providing technology training to 10,000 poor women belonging to the informal sector and enable them for full employment and self reliance, informs Dr (Ms) Vikas Goswami, lead CSR, Microsoft.

Perot India, which runs its gamut of CSR initiatives under the Deeksha umbrella, started in early 2008 and has been supporting Siragu Montessori School (run by Suyam Trust for Chennais pavement dwellers) and Kalaiselvi Karunalaya Social Welfare Society (KKSS). Further, as the program was introduced in other locations like Noida and Bangalore, other NGOs too were brought into the fold. In association with three NGOsSrijan, SETU foundation and Shanti Kaushal foundation, the company has contributed monetarily. Over the last eight months of its existence, Deeksha has mobilized over Rs 31 lakh.

IBM India, through its $75 mn Reinventing Education program, partners with governments and school systems around the world to develop and implement innovative technology solutions. In India, the company has partnered with state governments of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.

Page(s)   1  2