Volunteering for a Change
JSW Group’s volunteer program - Integrated Development through Employee Association (IDEA), is a bespoke employee volunteer initiative that commenced in 2018. It is designed and implemented to create maximum impact through collaborations while being aligned to other CSR activities of the company.
In the last one year, under IDEA, employees of the company have contributed in some extremely impactful ways in countering the multiple issues that troubled the district of Palghar in Maharashtra. A region that suffers greatly from malnutrition-related child deaths, severe drought issues, and unevolved social structures.
To counter such issues that plagued the society, and to create a more sustainable long term impact, intervention would be needed at the root of the problem. This is when when the JSW Group under the “Suddrirha Bharat Abhiyan”, implemented various solutions in the areas of agriculture, livelihood development, education, watershed development and advocacy, in the region. To counter the biggest issue of malnutrition related death of children, JSW Group IDEA Volunteers worked to track and identify malnourished children and supply them with the requisite healthcare facilities and nutritional supplements at Angadwadi Centres.
A Collective mind of professionals can produce something of value. That is exactly what we did. We identified the issues, analyzed possible solutions and then delivered a sustainable solution that we know that the community can benefit from for years to come.
I am very proud to be associated with the project of helping build a stronger India.
Bhagyashree Ingle & Vivekanand Avasarala,
Making it Better Everyday
Recently, IDEA volunteers commenced the intervention with a Root Cause Analysis, conducting ground-level surveys to understand the immediate needs of the community and to point out specific problems in Palghar. The team worked on community building, and water resource development, which required building solar based drinking water pumps and desilting of an abandoned well to meet drinking and agricultural water requirements.
The first village that benefited from the intervention of the IDEA volunteers was Sulechapada Village. Volunteers implemented a Solar-based drinking water program that apart from providing safe drinking water also countered the distances the community had to travel to access water in unsafe conditions. Today, 80 families and 450 members of the village have improved and safer access to a basic life necessity such as drinking water.
The second village that received help from the group was Ashe village of Mokhad. This village also suffered from water crisis after their only source of water was contaminated by the carcass of a bull drowned in it in 2004. Unable to release the carcass from the well, the community had shut the well down. Today, with the help of IDEA Volunteers who cleaned, repaired, distilled and rejuvenated this well, it has again become a reliable source of water for drinking as well as an agricultural purpose.
