The 6th edition of The CSR Journal Excellence Awards is all set to be held on the 9th of December 2023 at the Bombay Stock Exchange in Mumbai. The CSR Journal Excellence Awards aims to honour innovative and best practices in Corporate Social Responsibility, recognising the best practices in six categories. These are Education & Skill Training, Women Empowerment & Child Welfare, Environment, Agriculture & Rural Development, Health & Sanitation and Sports.
This year, our top three nominees in the Category of Education & Skill Training are Sobha Limited, Gland Pharma Limited and SRF Foundation.
Sobha Limited, an Indian multinational real estate company headquartered in Bengaluru, runs a charitable school namely The Sobha Academy in Kerala for underprivileged children. Hyderabad-based generic injectables manufacturing company Gland Pharma Limited is running the ‘Free Breakfast Programme’. Through this programme, they are providing free breakfast-cum-health support to underprivileged children studying in Government schools and lactating and expecting mothers in Anganwadi centres of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. SRF Foundation in collaboration with Schneider Electric India conducts the Schneider Electric Basic Electrician Training Program (BETP) in Mewat since 2011 with the objective of training the youth in electrician trade.
The Sobha Academy
The Sobha Academy focuses on providing good quality education to children from underprivileged families, totally free of cost. It also aims to empower the rural poor to make a permanent break from the vicious circle of poverty, ignorance, deprivation and exclusion through quality schooling experience.
Managed by the Sri Kurumba Educational and Charitable Trust, the CSR wing of Sobha Ltd, The Sobha Academy was established in the year 2007. The CBSE accredited institution is located at Panniayankara, Palakkad District. It is a registered charitable and educational society aimed at providing quality education to children. Headed by Mr. P.N.C. Menon, the trust also aims to reduce economic disparities in the society.
The Sobha Academy strives to develop students to become innovators and leaders by imparting rigourous training programme that utilizes academic, co-curricular, personality development and the latest pedagogical and technological developments.
The Sobha Academy includes learning guidance, strong support and counselling session for students in need of learning support or intensive remediation. Some of the problems addressed include reading deficits, behavioural problems, lack of parental support/involvement, lack of concrete connection to the real, competitive and technologically advanced world, lack of moral support etc.
Regular counselling sessions are conducted with parents where the Principal, teachers and the counsellor of the school discuss the performance of the students. Remedial ways for the improvement of the child’s academic and behavioural problems is also discussed. Counselling is also provided in adherence to two child norm and alcoholic de addiction.
Free Breakfast Programme
Gland Pharma Limited, a leading manufacturer of high-quality injectables, performs Corporate Social Responsibility through its public charitable trust, Gland-Fosun Foundation. The company’s ‘Free Breakfast Programme’ is providing free breakfast-cum-health support to underprivileged children studying in Government schools and lactating and expecting mothers in Anganwadi centres of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
This programme was started on 14th November 2019 (Chidlren’s Day) with about 7000 children and now food is being served to more than 16,000 children from 83 government schools along with 350 beneficiaries of 10 Anganwadi centres in Hyderabad. Of these, 43 schools are in Hyderabad, 40 are in Vishakhapatnam. In these Anganwadi centres, 3-6 year-old pre-school children, pregnant and lactating mothers are the beneficiaries.
Akshaya Patra Foundation is the implementing partner for this programme who serve the meals cooked in their huge community kitchens in Hyderabad and Vishakhapatnam. Many students from government schools come from financially poor background. These are the children of construction workers, migrant workers, daily labourers etc. Their parents usually go out of the house in search of work very early in the morning leaving the children hungry. So, these children do not get the motivation to come to school on an empty stomach.
This breakfast programme acts as an inducement to come to school and the Mid-day meal supports that. A filling and nutritious breakfast provides a healthy and great start to the day, which makes the children feel energised to go to school.
The kind of food served includes idli-sambhar-chutney, upma-chutney-pickle, khichri-mixture, pongal-sambar, tomato rice-raitha, pulihora-chutney-mixture, bisibele baath, etc.
Basic Electrician Training Programme
SRF Limited is a multi-business chemicals conglomerate engaged in the manufacturing of industrial and specialty intermediates. SRF Foundation formerly known as the Society for Education and Welfare Development was set up in the year 1982 as the Corporate Social Responsibility arm of SRF Limited.
In collaboration with Schneider Electric India, SRF Foundation has been conducting the Schneider Electric Basic Electrician Training Programme (BETP) in Mewat since 2011. Over the past year, the program has expanded to Madhya Pradesh’s Bhind and Gummidipoondi in Tamil Nadu.
The 4-month-long programme aims to train the youth in electrician trade, with a proper mix of practical and theoretical knowledge. The curriculum also includes imparting entrepreneurial skills, thereby encouraging the trainees to become self-employed.
