Ekal boosts India’s rural development

ORNAGE BURG, NY– Ekal is pulling out all the stops on village development in India and adopting ground-breaking methodology in the way it operates in rural-tribal areas.

Well, that’s the profound message that came out of Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation’s (EVF) just-concluded “International Conference” in Orangeburg, NY.

 

This 3-day conference, meant for national committees of the US, India, Canada and other countries, was convened not only for brain-storming sessions to critically assess the progress made so far, but also to charter EVF’s course for 2017.

 

Until now, ‘Ekal’ (as it is popularly known), had targeted 100,000 villages as its ‘goal’ for integrated development. Now, Ekal wants to reach out to all 600,000-plus rural/tribal areas in India. Considering it is already in 62,000 villages, this was inevitable.

 

Another reason for this ambitious undertaking is that it has picked up tremendous momentum in recent years in terms of enterprising entrepreneurs joining its fold everywhere with innovative ideas and actively pursuing various rural projects.

 

At the conference, Himanshu Shah, CEO of ‘Shah Capital’ and ‘Mohan Wanchoo’, CEO of ‘EC Info systems’ each pledged $100,000 to $200,000 a year, for the next several years to uplift rural lives.

 

Inspired by PM Modi’s ‘Swachchh Bharat’ initiative, Ekal’s ‘clean environment’ pilot project is already making its mark in some rural and tribal areas. Moreover, water conservation, organic farming, cottage industries that could empower young girls and women-folks are in full swing in most of the villages.

 

There are 53,000 Ekal schools in operation throughout rural India that benefit 1.5 million children.

 

Starting with this conference, Ekal-US is entering into ‘Social-Media’ arena with vengeance. The technology-savvy team, headed by Akshay Joshi includes Avinash Agarwal, Vinita Dogra, Arti Aggarwal and Sheetal Gupta.

 

It will be guided by Prashant Shah, a new member of Ekal-USA ‘Board of Directors’ and shall be advised by Prakash Waghmare and Ranjani Saigal, as necessary. In short, there is a new dawn at ‘Ekal Vidyalaya’ on every level.