Celebrate this New Year with Akshaya Patra
New Year will be here soon!
We all are in a bind about how to celebrate it. What shall our goals be for the coming year? How can we make it better?
You may be aiming for a new job, upskilling yourself for a new role or striving to get good grades. You may also be seeking to build new or strengthen existing relationships.
But how about adding a new goal that satisfies your sense of purpose in life – to be a better human being by helping the underprivileged?
And here’s the best part – you can do it right from where you are with a few clicks online!
If you like the idea, then join us. Let us have it as our collective resolution for 2023.
Join the
Akshaya Patra family this New Year
We at The Akshaya Patra Foundation have been providing
unlimited food for education of underprivileged children for 22 years. We
ensure that our meals meet the palatal preferences of children as well as align
with the nutrition guidelines from the Indian Government.
Our 65 kitchens across 14 states and 2 union territories
cater to underprivileged communities and disaster victims during emergencies.
61 of these kitchens are automated centralised facilities that cook between
3,000 to 0.2 million meals per cooking cycle, utilising gravity flow mechanisms
to minimise human touch for enhanced safety and quality.
Our journey
In 2015,
we airlifted 1,00,000 meals to earthquake-hit Nepal in April. We also
established an Earthquake Relief Centralised Kitchen in June 2015 to support
the affected people of the region. It was an initiative undertaken in
collaboration with Jamsetji Tata Trust and Sipradian Sahayata Sanstha. This kitchen
served 1.4 million meals to the affected people for 88 days.
We
conducted similar relief programmes in the subsequent years during floods and
cyclones in Chennai, Gujarat, Gorakhpur, North Karnataka, Kerala and Odisha.
Through these activities, we benefitted more than 2 million beneficiaries
across India.
Our work
was appreciated in 2017 when we received a National Award for
Child Welfare, Gujarat Flood Relief and Gorakhpur Flood Relief. In 2019,
we won the Gandhi Peace Prize, BBC World Service Global Food Champion Award, Outlook
Poshan Jury Award and Mahatma Award for Social Good.
During
our two-year-long COVID relief programme, we distributed over a million meals
and kits to the affected people. In 2021,
we were honoured with the Mahatma Award 2021 in the ‘COVID-19 Humanitarian
Effort’ category. In 2022, we
received the Prestigious Mahatma Award for Social Good and Impact ‘Zero Hunger’.
Other flagship programmes
As
our work supporting the Indian Government’s Midday Meal Programme (now called
the PM Poshan Abhiyaan) began to be recognised by people and the various
Governments globally, we started more initiatives to help the marginalised.
Below are some of them:
Anganwadi Feeding Programme
Anganwadi
Feeding is an initiative by the Government of India to nourish pregnant women
and nursing mothers for the healthy growth of their infants. The initial months
after a child is born are crucial for the development of their vital organs.
Hence, this programme was started to provide care to new mothers and their
babies. We help in its execution across India and have served 1,61,53,556 meals
so far.
Feed the Homeless Mothers Programme
Most
widowed women in Indian society are abandoned by their families with
necessities that last them only for a few days. To save these resources for the
future, they skip food frequently. We started feeding the homeless mothers to
give them a life of dignity and respect. Your support will give them nourishing
meals twice a day so that they can concentrate on making a living rather than
pondering over how to survive without food.
Breakfast
Feeding Programme
A review of a study by experts showed that at least
199 of 5,158 children get only one meal a day. Midday meal (MDM) is the first
meal for around 2.1 lakh children — not breakfast. Thus, we launched the
Breakfast Feeding Programme starting with the Government Schools of Tamil Nadu,
Telangana and Karnataka.
Digital
Education Programme
The COVID-19 pandemic magnified the digital divide,
where the underprivileged were forced to discontinue learning due to lack of
digital devices. Our digital education initiative in Government schools aims to
enhance the quality of education while generating excellent learning outcomes
and building a pleasurable schooling experience. It focusses on inclusiveness
while contributing to the Central Government’s vision for ‘Digital India’.
Millets in
mid-day meals for Government School Children
To enhance the quality of nutrition in school meals
and support sustainable food growing practices, we signed a Memorandum of
Understanding (MoU) with Nutrihub, the Indian Institute of Millets Research
(IIMR) and the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR) to introduce
millets in the mid-day meal menu for children. It was piloted in schools in
Bengaluru and Hyderabad and will slowly be executed in other locations as well.
Donate
Online this New Year
Choose any of our
programmes to empower the underprivileged this New Year. Make your celebrations
more memorable by donating towards their welfare and start the year on a
positive note.
With one contribution online, you will transform lives for the entire
year of 2023!
Donate for ayear filled with goodness!
