Areas of Work

Objective –

To provide a space that facilitates fulfilling of needs through donations.

To nurture a spirit and joy of giving in children.

Upayn is a Sanskrit word meaning “donation in the form of a gift”. Deepastambha hosts multiple donations under one roof, which includes donations like blood, eye, skin, clothes, toys, books, e-waste, medicine etc.

Donation is often perceived as an act where the donor assumes highest importance and hence the superiority.

Deepastambha’s Upayn, follows a common rule that the things given for donation should not be too old/torn or damaged and will have to be distributed as if they are gifts. At Deepastambha, donation is envisioned as an act, where both; the donors as well as the receivers occupy the place of dignity and hence should be duly treated.

Upayn runs on the principle of decentralization, thereby encouraging and planning these donation drives in collaboration with the community. With the participation of over thousands of people including the residential groups and companies, Upayn is like an annual celebration.   

Outreach-

Up till now Upayn has been organized in Nashik, Pune,Kolhapur and Mumbai, with more than 14 donation drives happening at once.

Objective-

To encourage Eco-Friendly celebrations by providing an alternative to pollution-causing practices.

The current trend of celebrations endangers the environment. An easy option frequently preferred is to ban practices which causes harm to the environment. However, to repair the root cause, it is also important to provide with an alternative to the current trends.

Eco-Paavitrya is one such space that not only suggests the alternatives but also provides platforms to practice them. Our vision is to reach schools across the globe through awareness campaigns, quizzes and contests.

Activities-

• Organizing various contests in schools like essay, slogan and poster making, skits and plays, eco-friendly decoration in schools across Pune.
• A project in collaboration with the Municipal corporation of Pune on reusing “Nirmalya” ( remains after an offering made to god) as compost.

Objectives –

• Promote modest use of non-renewable resources.
• Spread awareness about ways to energy-friendly  lifestyle.

In today’s world over-consumption and exhaustion of resources is a grievous challenge and an inseparable part of life. Though the dependency on energy resources cannot be completely cut off, there is still a scope to build what could be called an “energy friendly” lifestyle, by practicing modest use of available resources and by promoting use of durable, less- polluting alternatives.

The activities organized under “conserve to serve” mainly aim at spreading awareness about the crisis and promote conservation of electricity, fuel etc. They also include increasing familiarity with Solar energy as easily usable resource.

 Other activities that are initiated under “Conserve to serve are” :

• Exposure visits (sewage water plants, Solar plants etc)
• Tree plantation drives

Outreach and impact-

Green-army has been set up by Deepastambha where the “soldiers” look after plantation drives and ensure that they are taken care of post the act of plantation.  

Until now, this army has planted about 150 trees and has been engaged in their regular maintenance.

Objective –

With an objective of introducing and inculcating critical enquiry and research skills in students, two platforms were initiated by Deepastambha; Skool Falak and Skool Sansad.

Both these activities stand on the common rationale;

• To encourage critical thinking skills

• To provide a platform to research, think, articulate and express

• Encourage social awareness

Skool Falak

Objectives –

• To Create a knowledge / information base among school students through Skool-FALAK.
• Display of information carrying huge significance with their daily lives.
• School students must know certain important aspects of Social Life around them.
• Need for them to understand, observe the social set-up and the way it is operated.
• As they are to be the future of India, in it’s developing stage, they are prone to learn vital social attributes in most effective manner, apparently carrying a better possibility of impact.

To put on the information to the extent of covering:

• Factual Information
• News feeds, updates
• Issues having generic civic impact
• Extra-Curricular

Outreach and Impact–

• 80+ schools across Pune.

Skool Sansad

Skool Sansad is an experiential platform, recreating the experience of parliamentary procedures for students. Students come together and form a council where the social issues are raised, discussed and are also expected to be resolved by them.

This is an annual event, where 30 schools are shortlisted each year for participation.

Both the activities have been created and conducted aiming to give the students as much opportunities to engage with the information, judge its reliability , form an opinion and take inclusive decisions.

Creating Learning materials

Deepastambha has been engaged in developing learning materials to support children with special needs and those with slow pace of learning.

Outreach –

Schools in Pune and Lonavala.

Awareness on child abuse

Study says that most of child Abuse cases can be avoided/reduced just by doing awareness amongst teachers, Parent and children. We have designed our own program and exploring various options for doing the awareness. We are focusing more on prevention of child abuse by doing various awareness sessions at schools.

Gramarthan is a reflection of Deepastambha’s vision of sustainable rural development, which effectively covers: ecological, cultural and economic aspects of rural lives. Based on the principles of sustainability and ownership, Gramarthan’s rationale is to explore and execute the participatory models by encouraging the values of self-governance and self-sustainability in rural communities.

The quest of Gramarthan began in 2013, with identifying communities that would be the prototype of our vision. After an exhaustive process of field visits, meetings with the domain experts, developing approaches, searching for alternatives and the implementation of those approaches, today Gramarthan stands as a development model aiming at:

• Assisting villages in fulfilling the basic needs with the help of natural resources.
• Ensuring expert’s guidance through planned interactions with the community.
• Assisting community members to avail necessary health, educational facilities along with alternative livelihood options.
• Encouraging women empowerment
• Self-sufficient community model
• Enabling access to technological advancements

Area of Work

• Villages – Ranjane, Kondgaon, Khamgaon, Ambed (Tal- Velha, Dist- Pune)

Work Domain

• Swacha Maze Gaon – Cleanliness drive and awareness for 450+ houses

Working in Three Steps

1. 1. Step 1- Swacha Maze Ghar (My House)
   2. Step 2- Swacha Maze Parisar (My Surrounding)
   3. Step 3- Swacha Maze Gaon (My Village)

• Water Management- (Working in watershed management and Groundwater water Management.)

1. 1. Build 25 lac litres water reservoir in Village Ranjane – under CSR project with Renishaw Metrology Systems. Pune.
   2. Desilting and wall repairing of two check dams and two diversion dams in village Ambed and Khamgaon under CSR project with Praj Foundation. Water recharge increases in proportion of desilting. Expected water recharge is 20 times of the total desilt (in liters). Due to pores opening achieved as a result of desiltation work. Due to this, we achieve Approximately Water Recharge amount is 436, 00,000 liter.

• Niramaya (Health & Hygiene) – (More than 1200 villagers are taking benefits from this initiative)  

1. 1. Awareness campaigns,
   2. Regular OPD
   3. Various health camps- Anemia checkup, eye checkup, Breast/cervical cancer screening camp.

• Educational activities –

1. 1. Skool-Falak (To encourage critical enquiry and research skills)
   2. Setting up libraries and activities for developing reading skills
   3. Skill development programs

The outreach is five (4 primary and 1 secondary) schools covering more than 130 students.

• Village Team building –

This covers a wide range of activities; right from screening movies, celebrating festivals, call for volunteers to organizing Gramsabhas, to encourage maximum participation from the villagers as well as to facilitate team’s interaction with them.

• Women Empowerment –

1. 1. Skill building sessions
   2. Sessions on entrepreneurship development by experts.

1. 1. Sessions aiming at confidence building
   2. Counseling sessions for family members.

The outreach of women empowerment program is over 150 women.

Objective –

Create awareness about health and hygiene by providing access to health check-up amenities.

सर्वे भवन्तु सुखिनः सर्वे सन्तु निरामयाः / May all be happy and healthy. 

It was with this thought and the realisation that, health is a centre around and with which everything else prospers, Niramayaa was started. 

Under Niramayaa, health checkup as well as medication facilities are provided in the rural areas around Pune and slum areas in the city, along with the awareness campaigns. An extensive range is covered under these sessions from

Blood-pressure, eye-sight to cervical and breast cancer. 

Other activities organized by Niramayaa include-

• Monthly OPD 
• Diet counseling and monitoring sessions for women.
• Anemia detection and medication sessions
• Healthy lifestyle
• Awareness on Physical and Mental health
• Various health camps such as Eye check-ups, dental check-up etc.
• Hygiene awareness in women

Outreach- 

400 women , 200+ children , 2000+ villagers,  from villages and slum areas have taken benefit of these camps.

The best gift we can offer is quality time, love and happiness.

Isn’t it just blissful to take break from our bottle-tight schedules, and spend the day with making new friends, exchanging stories of joys and griefs, and yes! playing loads of games.

In search for quality time, we visit Home run for young kids, children with special needs, and elderly people, and together we celebrate festivals, plan picnics and organize funfairs.

A movement started by Youth in Pune in 2017 to encourage individual contribution for nation’s development.

India is fast approaching its peak demographic dividend so it’s best time for India to excel by all means.

i4India is the movement where in one can contribute personally, professionally or socially  keeping nation building back of the mind

As an Indian it’s our responsibility to take our nation to new heights and that is possible only if we are ready to work towards it.

India is for me

I am for India

Deepastambha offers to its volunteers a platform to explore and initiate action to bring their visions into reality. It’s because of our volunteers that Deepastambha has been able to cover a wide range of activities;

For e.g.

• Traffic Awareness drives, Don’t Drink and drives, Ensuring awareness and following of the traffic rules in association with Traffic Police, Pune.
• Cleaning drives (Taljai, Khadakvasla, Nashik and nearby places ).
• Campaigns against spitting and throwing garbage in public places.
• Knowledge sharing sessions on various social issues.
• Field exposure visits.
• New Initiatives.
• Exploring new social issues, Engagement with residents of slums, Animal Rights.

Mission

To change people’s mindset by encouraging maximum people for the role of Help-felicitator

Vision

To build a trustworthy and consistently emerging network of the Giver and Seeker by 2030 across the world.

Type of help : Emergencies, Guidance and Support

Geographical Area : Maharashtra and member referral outside Maharashtra

Availability : 24 x 7

Role of Help Desk Soldier

• Person who is taking care of assigned need
• Trained for the role of soldier
• Maximum availability for the given commitment
• Strictly following the defined helpdesk guidelines