With yet another year of delivering its purpose of helping underprivileged children in India access their right to education, P&G India closed its signature CSR program Shiksha 2011-12 with its largest ever impact of reaching 385,000 children. In association with partner NGO's Round Table India (RTI), Army Wives Welfare Association (AWWA), Navy Wives Welfare Association (NAWWA), Air force Wives Welfare Association (AFWWA), Save the Children (STC) amongst others, Shiksha now covers the length and breadth of India by helping build, support and reactivate over 200 schools till date. In 2011, Shiksha strengthened its vision of creating tangible impact "Brick by Brick" through the building of schools across the nation.
This year, P&G's Shiksha initiative has facilitated the addition of a digital library and distance learning programme at the Government High School, Lodhimajra, Himachal Pradesh which allows experts from other cities to conduct lectures & sessions on various topics directly for the students. They have also partnered with project Ekta, Government of Rajasthan and NGO IBTADA, to adopt a girls school 'Mewat Balika Vidyalaya' with the mutual vision of helping girls in rural Rajasthan access quality education.
Shweta Shukla, Associate Director & Head - Communications, Procter & Gamble India said, "Our vision of purpose-inspired growth continues to drive us to touch and improve more lives, everyday. Shiksha has grown from strength to strength over the past years. Today, Shiksha is a national consumer movement with a strengthened vision of building schools to give more and more children the invaluable gift of education. This year has been very successful as we were able to reach out to over 385,000 children through 200 schools across India. With each passing year, we aim to further strengthen this vision by continuing to build & support more schools thus enabling more underprivileged children access their right to education".
Our key NGO partner Round Table India, spearheaded the identification, establishment, completion and maintenance of RTI Shiksha School projects across the country bringing onboard expertise in building schools as well as contribution towards funds. We thank RTI for their support to Shiksha helping impact a larger number of children this year.
NGOs AWWA & NWWA Sankalp school serve the needs of differently-abled children from Army & Navy families and local NGOs where P&G plants are present focusing on community development.
NGO 'Save the Children,' the world's leading organization that works to inspire breakthroughs in the way the world treats children to achieve immediate and long-lasting changes in their lives. Through Shiksha, P&G reaches out to 21[i] Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidhyalays in Rajasthan & Jharkhand to impact the lives of 5300 + underprivileged girls in these regions.
In addition to its existing partners, P&G has gone one step further and has extended support to Air force Wives Welfare Association (AFWWA) & Pratham Mysore. The contribution made to AFWWA will help better the existing condition of their Umeed school in Delhi to provide a more wholesome learning environment for the children while Pratham Mysore will focus on improving learning outcomes of village children in and around Mysore city.
Shiksha has over the years received generous support from many thought leaders & celebrities such as Anupam Kher, Dr. Kiran Bedi, Rani Mukherjee, John Abraham, Abhay Deol, Sushmita Sen, Kareena Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Sharmila Tagore, Konkona Sen, Neha Dhupia, Soha Ali Khan, Lara Dutta, Preity Zinta, Jacqueline Fernandez, Jatin Das, Shaan and many more. P&G's multiple stakeholder approach involving employees, trade & retailers, media and consumers has resulted in Shiksha becoming a national consumer movement. In 2011, P&G employees from across the country came together to physically help complete the infrastructure development at the Shiksha Sadhana School in Pune, and built a wall and furniture for the school with their own hands.
Shiksha is an integral part of P&G's global philanthropy program - Live, Learn & Thrive, currently reaching over 50 million children. In the last 8 years of the Shiksha program, P&G has made a cumulative donation of over Rs 27 crores to the cause of providing children the invaluable gift of education and enabling them to access this basic right.
With its motto of 'Padhega India Toh Badhega India' Shiksha believes that the secret to a brighter India lies in children attaining their right to a good quality education. Shiksha empowers consumers to lead social change in the area of education for children via a simple purchase of any of P&G's large packs of Tide, Ariel, Pantene, Olay, H&S, Rejoice, Vicks VapoRub, Whisper, Gillette Mach 3 Turbo, Gillette Series, Oral B, Duracell or Pampers during the months of January, February & March. Irrespective of sales, every year P&G commits to a minimum donation of Rs. 1 cr.