Achiever's Success Story
“Mr. Ashish Agrawal, Founder , Bridge4Change”
He hails from Bihar where he did his schooling. He did his Engineering from MIT, Pune in 2010, before joining Mu Sigma as a Senior Business Analyst. Being passionate towards country’s social development, he pursued his masters from Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA). Post MBA, he worked as Block Project Manager in Jeevika, a World Bank funded project in Bihar where he led the team facilitating 2300+ Self Help Groups empowering over 25000+ families through different livelihood promotion based initiatives.
He then joined Paryavaran Mitra in Nov’14 as Founder ,Director at Manav Sadhna, Gandhi Ashram. Solving puzzles being his hobby, he has also authored a book ‘Demystified’ around logical thinking.
The Paryavaran Mitra Model:
Paryavaran Mitra is an NGO based in Gandhi Ashram, Ahmedabad. It is a business based service model aimed at bringing positive changes in the life of rag-picking community in a holistic manner. In its 6.5years journey so far, it has:
- a) empowered 300+ rag-picking sisters and their families in holistic manner across 5 communities in Ahmedabad
- b) facilitated recycling of 2.8+million kgs of waste,
- c) generated employment for 45+ members team
- d) institutionalized meaningful engagement with 40+ organizations, 5500+ families and over 15,000 individuals.
It is a blessing to have United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Ahmedabad Cantonment Board (Ministry of Defense), TCS etc. are our long term partners in this journey. Paryavaran Mitra being a social enterprise, they also conducted seminars and 1-day workshops in India, UK and US at different universities.
The current mission:
ONE SMALL STEP FOR MAN, ONE GIANT LEAP FOR MANKIND – Neil Armstrong India is into 74th year of its Independence. Lakhs of Individuals and institutions are relentlessly working to make our society a better place to live-in. But, we all know that we are far from being called a just society.
After serving in development sector for almost a decade at grassroots level, I realized that there are some hardcore, deep rooted systemic issues which need to be addressed first to witness the desired positive state of society. I felt an unsettling need to do an in-depth research demystifying the core fabric of our existing system.
Therefore, I have embarked on a journey #ProjectManthanm (https://youtu.be/JTMByJjneuY) to visit 100+ organizations serving responsibly, brainstorm with 1000+ enthusiastic, learned stakeholders (academicians, social change-makers, administrative officials, politicians etc.) across 40+ cities in next 6-8months to possibly come-up with a framework to address the systemic issues.