Meals with a Motto - Akshaya Patra's Mission

Indian meals worldwide are known for their variety of spices and flavours. In fact, Indian food theory states that our food has six different flavours: bitter, sour, salty, astringent, spicy and sweet.

That’s precisely why Akshaya Patra’s kitchens smell of amazing spices and flavours in meals that are cooked in stringent hygiene conditions. For us, feeding more children doesn’t mean compromising on the quality. We believe every Indian child is entitled to a complete meal replete with all the six flavours of the Indian Food Theory.

We wish to provide the benefits of mid-day meals to 5 million children by the end of 2020. Akshaya Patra recently celebrated the serving of 2 Billion Meals while the count so far is 2.12 Billion Meals. We strongly believe that no child must go hungry and that each child has the right to receive nutritious meal every day for ensuring his/her physical and mental growth.

Benefits of Mid-Day Meals

Since the year 2000, The Akshaya Patra Foundation has been running a feeding programme in active collaboration with the government. Today, it is the world’s largest NGO-run feeding programme serving over 1.6 million children across 13,210 in 26 locations of 11 Indian states. But when we started off, our ambition was not to become world’s largest, our mission was to feed the largest possible number of children. Currently, we are running the Joy of Giving festival which would conclude on October 8, 2016. You can join us in celebrating the joy by feeding the hungry.

What truly drive us are the various benefits that the children get through Mid-Day Meals. Here are some:

- Children are motivated to come to school due to a nutritious free of cost meal available in their nearest schools

- Parents are now sending girls to schools since one-time meal of a girl child is taken care of

- Children with an inclination for studies are encouraged to pursue vocations and have aspirations

- The Mid-Day Meal Programme also involves an overall development of children through formal education and teaching facilities

Meals with a Motto

Akshaya Patra has been able to transform the lives of millions of children in the last 16 years in its mission to provide ‘Unlimited Food for Education.’ The organisation is now on a mission to complete 5 billion meals by the end of 2020 – an ambition that it aims at achieving by channelising people and organisations.

Feeding the hungry is a noble cause but it needs a plan, a well thought-out framework and in our case, a lot of accountability. We don’t just encourage donations but also make sure that people know where their money is going and how exactly it is being used. We have a strong mechanism to ensure that people contribute with all their heart not just mechanically using technology. Stories about our NGO have reached almost all the states in their languages including our national language Hindi.

Apart from online donations, people may also contribute by registering for corporate volunteering or fundraising.  We urge you to join our mission. We promise to be transparent and determined to reach our targets of feeding the hungry.

Akshaya Patra Serving a Plateful of Smiles | World Smile Day 2016

A warm smile is the universal language of kindness. No one said it better than late William Arthur Ward, a renowned author, who rightly related smile with kindness. It’s the principle that has inspired several acts of philanthropy around the world.

Here’s a quick bite on World Smile Day! A commercial artist named Harvey Ball, who is known to have created the Smiley Face, initiated this day back in 1963 with a similar thought in mind. After his death in 2001, the Harvey Ball World Smile Foundation created the slogan – Improving the world, one smile at a time. And smile, often the result of a moment of happiness, is a thing to be shared and spread around.

For many people around the world, just getting decent meals for one day is a matter of happiness. On World Smile Day, let’s pledge to donate to charity. If you have any non-profit fundraising ideas related to providing meals to school children, it will definitely help Akshaya Patra in spreading smiles.

Healthy Meals for Kids

For children, food is directly related to happiness. A child’s day consists of the games he plays and the food he eats. And so at Akshaya Patra, feeding hungry children is not only a duty but also a matter of happiness. Through our Mid-Day Meal Programme, we strive to spread smiles with each meal. Being the world’s largest not-for-profit Mid-Day Meal Programme, the organisation serves wholesome food to over 1.6 million children in India.

What truly drives our initiative, however, is the smiles of various children who are now motivated to study and come to school. That’s because we believe it’s also equally vital to ensure their happiness in future by making them independent and educated. We wish to spread the happiness of aspirations among these children by taking care of their meals in school so they could focus on their mental and physical growth.

In government schools in India, several children have a natural acclivity for academics. They have dreams and are often inspired to make a difference in the environment around them. One such student is Bhanupriya who studies in a Government Higher Primary School in Bengaluru. Talking about her aspirations, she says, “There are many people who are unwell. I wish to be a doctor and serve them. I would treat poor patients for free.” (Read her story at Stories of Children)

Bhanupriya, like her counterparts in private schools around the country, has ambitions of her own. Dearth of resources around her is in no way a hurdle to her dreams but she makes the best of her school education and studies diligently. With the motto ‘food for education,’ Akshaya Patra aims at ensuring future happiness of children.

Happiness is Feeding the Hungry

Akshaya Patra offers several opportunities and invites people to contribute for the cause of happiness. We strive to engage people in civic-minded activities through non-profit fundraising ideas. Fundraising is definitely one of the most effective ways to help a cause – you can help feed a child for an entire academic year by donating only Rs 950!

Akshaya Patra’s Mid-Day Meal Programme is run with the support of the government and many individuals and corporates. With small contribution, you can engage in deeper acts of happiness and kindness – it may turn out to be more rewarding than you think as you join hands with an organisation that has made a huge difference since the year 2000.

We have found a way to spread happiness through meals, have you? Donate today!

Why Elimination of Hunger Is A Cause We Should All Invest In?

How we take our life on Earth for granted? We hear and witness hard-hitting headlines around the world, of thousands of lives affected every day. One such issue is hunger, a forlorn state where lives get defeated fighting for food. Hunger is the number one cause of death in the world with 795 million of the total world’s population sleeping hungry every day. And out of which 212 million belong to India itself.

At The Akshaya Patra Foundation, each stomach that goes empty is important. Our Mid-Day Meal Programme attempts to feed the hungry with a focus on children going to schools. Did you know that one of the most powerful economies of the world – India – is also home to one-third of world's hungry? As many as 3000 children are becoming victims of hunger and malnutrition every day. Is there a more pressing reason why you should contribute to eradicate hunger?

Is that my cause?

Many of you often think about social causes, to invest a share of your income for a cause you believe in. But then the whole process of making the effort seems challenging and you eventually abandon the thought.

When Akshaya Patra made the ambition of feeding 5 million children in the country by 2020, the organisation was confident that hunger was a cause worth investing in. While most of you think that the role of NGOs is to help the underprivileged groups, you somehow settle with the idea that this cause is not for you. However, Akshaya Patra knows the value of each coin, humbly acknowledging that we cannot run our school lunch programme without your help. The reason why we have several members, workers, volunteers and donors working tirelessly each day is because we all understand that elimination of hunger can safeguard the future of our children.

School children need your attention

Children are the future of the nation and to build a great future, we need to serve them in the present. Hunger prevents them from going to school, playing and learning. Hunger often strips the children off their precious childhood as they are compelled to earn their living.

So Akshaya Patra realised that the most vital demographic in the quest for feeding the hungry is children. Do you think so too? If yes, we urge you to sponsor a child throughout his academic year by investing Rs 750. The small act with a great thought creates a huge difference in their lives. When you choose to sponsor a child, you directly contribute in the making of a complete citizen. Of course, your donation is exempted from taxes.

Today hunger is a challenge before the literate and the healthy. We all need to conspire against hunger if we truly wish to create an equal and competitive society. Small deeds often bring big changes. Donate your share and take responsibility to eliminate hunger in India.

Making a Difference in Assam and Rest of India

This year, Akshaya Patra completes 16 years of its extensive journey aimed to feed the hungry children in India. In 2013, we met Durga Prasad—one of the students in Guwahati, Assam, who suffered from anorexia and malnourishment before he was enrolled in school. His teachers reported that in only a couple of years, Durga’s health had significantly improved after Akshaya Patra’s mid-day meal in Assam began to benefit his life.

The Akshaya Patra Foundation, an NGO in Assam and nine other states in India, has implemented Mid-Day Meal Scheme in many government schools to omit classroom hunger in India. In Assam particularly, the State Government invited Akshaya Patra to implement mid-day meal programme to reduce dropout rates and eliminate child labour in the state. In 2010, a centralised kitchen was set up in Guwahati—Assam’s largest city, which now serves over 53,000 children every day.

Since 2000, it has been the organisation’s vision that no child in India should be deprived of education due to hunger and envisages to feed 5 million children by 2020. One of the most important aspects of the organisation which has led the programme towards achievements is Compassion—when His Divine Grace AC Bhakivedanta Swami Prabhupada saw a group of children fighting with street dogs over scraps of food and decided that no child should go hungry in India.

Here are some of the progresses made by Akshaya Patra in the last 16 years:

• From 1500 school children in Bengaluru to over 1.5 million beneficiaries across 10 states in India
• Expanded its feeding initiative from mid-day meals to Anganwadi feeding, old-age homes, disaster relief and many more
• Upgraded the kitchen equipment to high-tech sustainable resources such as 304 grade stainless steel
• Stretched its presence towards different parts of the globe: the USA and UK

Certainly, The Foundation’s method to reach millions of children over the years has seen great success. With successful partnership with Central Government and State Governments, the Foundation has been able to make a massive difference in many children’s lives who are now assured of education and good health. It is due to adapting sustainable technology and resources and maintaining transparency in all its activities that it has been possible for Akshaya Patra to reach millions of children every day. More than 12 of Akshaya Patra’s kitchens have received ISO certification for they are a beacon of quality.

To add to its successes, Akshaya Patra Foundation won the prestigious Nikkei Asia Prize 2016 for its outstanding achievements in ‘Economic and Business Innovation’ category and for contributing towards a better future for Asia. So far, the mid-day meal programme has expanded from 1500 children to over 1.5 million children making it the world’s largest NGO -run Mid-Day Meal Scheme.

To end the lingering hunger among children, it costs Rs. 750 to feed a child for an entire year. You can get involved too by making this contribution and ensuring children in India do not go hungry.

Fighting Child Hunger and Improving Education

Food is one of the essentials needed to survive on this earth. However, all of us are not lucky enough to receive a sufficient supply due to many reasons.  It is shocking to know that about 870 million people in the world struggle for a square meal every day due to extreme poverty.

When we talk about hunger children always come at the forefront as they are the worst affected. Lack of food or nutrition during the early stages of growth can lead to several health problems and sometimes even to death. Here are some statistics on children and hunger:

• Malnutrition kills about 3.1 million children every year
• About 100 million children (one out of six) in developing countries fall below the recommended weight
• One in four children in the world is stunted
• About 66 million primary school children go hungry  to school 

Measures have been taken to bring these numbers down and works by The World Food Programme (WFP), the largest anti-hunger agency of the UN in the world, have been quite inspiring. Interestingly, the agency feeds 80 million people in 75 countries every year.

From the past 54 years, the agency has been trying constantly to eliminate hunger and provide children an opportunity to attend school.  For this purpose, WFP supplies nutritious school meals to over 20 million children across the world.

The initiative has helped bring children back to school and bring hopes in millions of families. These meals, in a way, have also provided underprivileged children all the nutrition needed for growth.  The school meal programme has also given an opportunity to utilise the local resources and increase their demand.

Who else help school children in India - an overview:

• The Akshaya Patra Foundation: The NGO, at present feeds freshly cooked nutritious mid-day meals to over 1.4 million school children in 10 states.

• Annamrita:  The NGO feeds 1.2 million meals in eight states in India.

• Nanhi Kali:  The NGO  helps provide education to girls

• Smile Foundation: is dedicated to empower underprivileged children, youth and women. 

A 2013 report on school feeding programmes across 169 countries released by the World Food Project ranked India 12^th among lower middle income countries. During that time, India was feeding 114 million school children every day.

Some of the organisations which have helped improve lives of school children in India include:

These organisations have helped feed the hungry, provide education and empowerment and brought hope to millions of school children. However, there is a long way to go in eliminating classroom hunger altogether or providing education to all.

But, it is very much achievable. Just keep the good works going and soon ‘child hunger is gone’ will be a beautiful truth.