Bajaj Electricals Ltd. Joins hands with ChildFund India towards flagship education program for Rural India ‘Reading Improvement - Books, my Friends’ - “'Mutthi mai Aasma - Sky is the Limit” Program

After the successful implementation of ChildFund India’s nationwide campaign - Books, my Friends’ Phase 1 & 2, which involved distribution of age appropriate story books and solar lanterns to nearly 40,000 children, the international child development organization is all set to launch the campaign’s 3rd phase. 

ChildFund India in association with the CSR division of Bajaj Electricals Ltd today announced the launch of its flagship education program‘Reading Improvement - Books, my Friends campaign’s Phase 3 Initiative titled “'Mutthi mai Aasma - Sky is the Limit” in Mumbai.

As a start, ChildFund India has set-up over 100 solarized well equipped libraries in government schools across its implementation areas, by working with its 60 local community based partners.

Further, to make reading material more accessible to children, ChildFund has also introduced solar powered Mobile Libraries, beginning with the first one in Bangalore, which is sponsored by Axis Bank and summarized by Bajaj Electricals. ChildFund aspires to ultimately transform all the government schools in its implementation areas into well-equipped Model schools and introduce more Mobile libraries to empower our children.

This event will unveil the campaign’s final phase by inaugurating Solarpowered model government schools consisting of water pump, street lights, toilets, well-equipped libraries, etc. in two of ChildFund India’s implementation areas - Udaipur in Rajasthan and Jhabua in MP, with support from the CSR division of Bajaj Electricals Ltd.

Both the Schools were off grid, had no access to electricity, no provision to clean and safe drinking water or water for sanitization. In order to support the schools and to promote non-conventional source of Energy, Solar rooftops (with battery backup of up to 8 hrs), Solar Street Light & LED Lights, were installed by Bajaj Electricals. Bajaj Electricals also donated Fans, Water Purifiers and computers to both the Schools.

At the Government Middle school, Dhar, Bajaj Electricals installed Solar water pumps and gave the school an infrastructural makeover by painting the school, improving the toilets facilities and providing water storage tanks.

Taking it forward, the idea behind this CSR Initiatives was to make demonstrative model “Light up School “with eco-friendly solar energy, especially to off grid schools, so that alternative Night school option and Solar Library can made available for the students. These models can be created across states and such initiatives can be supported as a holistic model. Improving drinking water facilities, Infrastructure and sanitation needs of School will make the place cleaner & happier.

This event also comprises of a thought provoking hour long Panel Discussion based on the topic of literacy in India, exploring the subject of reading among 6 to 14 year old children and how we can help them develop affinity towards reading is organized among esteemed panelists from the fields of CSR, Education and Literature. The discussion will steer towards special focus on children in rural sections, importance of inculcating the habit of reading from an early age among children, the barriers to reading, the root causes behind low literacy levels in rural India as well as the various obstacles in the way of enhancing literacy levels with a hope to start a ‘literary movement for literacy’ while joining hands with individuals as well as organizations for a bigger impact.

Mr. Shekhar Bajaj, Chairman & Managing Director, Bajaj Electricalssaid "Bajaj Electricals  has always been committed to support meaningful community investment which will brighten up lives and better the future of generations to come. It gives us tremendous satisfaction to see that Bajaj Electricals through its CSR efforts are connected to the society through its various initiatives. Bajaj Electricals through its CSR division has contributed to improve the facilities of Schools in MP and Rajasthan and also provide access to solar power to the off grid schools so that children feel good about going to school and take reading at the libraries set up in these schools by ChildFund India. We will continue to support many such useful interventions which are sustainable and to the benefit of society at large.”

Mr. Geoffrey Petkovich, Asia Regional Director, ChildFund Internationalsaid, “Our program outcomes over the years have shown that child-friendly learning aids and teaching methodology helps enhance learning and comprehension capability of children. Hence, we conceptualized Reading Improvement program, not only to promote a culture of reading but also to help children and youth develop a taste for reading which impacts their learning levels, in the long run.”

Ms. Neelam Makhijani, National Director, Child Fund India said “We are not only investing in the structure but also towards sustainability of these libraries and schools. The children we work with are first learners’ in their families, we will continue our support for 3-5 years, during which we plan build capacity of the communities to take on the ownership of these libraries. We will monitor, guide and support them, will stay connected with them even after completion of the project duration but the onus of maintaining the libraries will be with the community members.”