Parivaar Education Society
Cause and the Mission:
Education and long-term overall development of young children from
destitute and vulnerable backgrounds.
Profile:
Parivaar is a humanitarian service organization, based at 24 Parganas (S), West Bengal, and, at present, is
chiefly working for total care and overall development of orphans, girls highly vulnerable to exploitation, victimization,
and trafficking and extremely impoverished children from tribal areas from 11 districts of
West Bengal and Jharkhand.
Starting from scratch and thereafter developed brick by brick, Parivaar Ashram is being continuously
developed and molded into a unique institution transforming the lives of each of its residential members
(children and adults) and acting as a training ground of highly dedicated life-committed grassroots
workers. As of December 1st 2012, there are 735 resident children at Parivaar. At the Parivaar campus is
also located Parivaar's own Formal School 'Amar Bharat Vidyapeeth where the resident children of
Parivaar study.
Parivaar is one of the largest free residential institutions for children from destitute backgrounds in
Eastern India, and is seen as a model institution in the field of child caretaking and overall development.
It is the recipient of the National Child Welfare Award 2011 presented by the Honorary President of India,
which is the highest recognition given by the Government of India to any organization working in the
field of child welfare.
Parivaar's institutions:
A. Parivaar Ashram Boys' Residential Institution (having 490 resident boys)
B. Parivaar Sarada Teertha Girls' Residential Institution (having 245 resident girls)
C. Parivaar Bonogram Centre
D. Parivaar Nivedita House
E. Amar Bharat Vidyapeeth (English medium Formal High School affiliated to West Bengal Board of Education)
In all, Parivaar institutions are spread over 20 acres (60 bighas) of land.
The Beginning
Parivaar was started by Vinayak Lohani, who, inspired by spiritual and humanistic ideals of Sri
Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda, decided to devote his entire life to serving the 'Divinity of Man'
as taught by Swami Vivekananda. He did his B.Tech at IIT Kharagpur, worked at Infosys (2000-01), and
then did his MBA from IIM Calcutta (2001-03). Immediately after graduating from IIM in 2003, with just
3 children in a small rented building and almost no financial resources, Vinayak started Parivaar. Till he
had 15 children at Parivaar, he used to give some lectures for students appearing for Management
entrance examinations and through that could meet the expenses for this tiny household. Gradually people
began to be inspired by this dedicated service and started to support the initiative and the number of
children at Parivaar grew. At the end of 2004, Parivaar could purchase its own land to develop its
permanent campus called Parivaar Ashram. Parivaar's mission and theme began to attract dedicated
youth, many of whom joined Parivaar Ashram as resident workers and began to become bearers of this
mission.
Vinayak lives with his huge family of children and fellow-Sevavratees at Parivaar Ashram.
At Class 10 State Board examinations, Parivaar has had 100% pass rate in all of its batches. There have
been students scoring as high as 85%. These students did not have any exposure to any kind of education
till the age of 9 or 10, and after a fast-learning bridging course they were admitted straight to the 4th or 5th
grade. They are now being trained for engineering and medical entrance examinations and have been
enrolled with some leading coaching institutes for the same.
Having developed fine processes in residential caretaking and overall development of children with
impoverished backgrounds and vulnerability, Parivaar is now endeavoring to move on a faster scaled
trajectory. In the 24-month phase July 2012- June 2014 Parivaar is aiming to scale up to a level of 1200
resident children (from the present level of 735 children) and the infrastructure development for the
same.
Other Initiatives
Vinayak Lohani has also used competencies of Parivaar in mentoring a large number of organizations in
different parts of India, and has helped many of these organizations to reach a certain maturity level
through the collaborative platform of donors, volunteers, and service-delivery grassroots NGOs called
'Caring Friends,' ( www.caringfriends.in ) of which he has been an integral part.
Many academic case-studies have been authored on Vinayak and Parivaar, dealing with grassroots Social
Entrepreneurship and Organization-building. These cases have been taught and discussed at various B-
Schools in India. Best-selling author Rashmi Bansal's book 'I have a Dream' has an entire chapter on
Vinayak Lohani and the initial phase of Parivaar.
In 2011, Government of India's Ministry of Women and Child Development invited him to the
membership of the Ministry's Task Force to review past Government schemes and formulate new ones,
and he is one of the very few persons from the Non-Governmental / civil society sector from the entire
country to be inducted into it.
Village Service Activities
i. Education Excellence Program for village students has been started for 1500
meritorious students from the Bakhrahat area in the 10 Km radius of the Parivaar
Ashram. These students are provided books and stationery material, and ensured that
they do not drop out in their education. This will scale up considerably as a separat
project, benefiting hundreds of other students from villages.
ii. Welfare work of medical help, emergency pecuniary help and organizing sports
events for village youth has continued. Hepatitis-B Vaccination Camps have been
organized in which 800 people from villages have taken Hepatitis B vaccination in 3
rounds (each after a monthly interval). In fact, Parivaar is like a guardian to its
neighboring villages, as anyone who is in any kind of crises knows that Seva-vratees
at Parivaar are always there to do whatever they can, ever-ready to serve.
iii. Ambulance Service for villages: Parivaar has started a 24-hour Ambulance
service for the population in the adjoining rural areas. Since there were no hospitals
in the nearby area, all patients in critical condition had to be taken to hospitals in
Kolkata. General village populations used to face enormous hardship in taking the
patients to hospitals in the city at odd hours with no means of public or private
transport available at such times. Now they can -due to Parivaar's Ambulance
services.
iv. Monthly Foodstock Scheme for old and ailing villagers: In the Panchayat area
and adjoining Panchayats, 700 old and ailing people are under the Monthly
Foodstock Scheme, meaning they receive a stipulated quantity of rice, dal (lentils),
oil.and other foods required for the month, and medical help when required. These
people are not in a position to fend for themselves, nor do they have any family
support. A large number of them are old widows.
Field-base in tribal areas
Parivaar is the hub of training of Seva-vratees, and also the base for many other projects serving the rural
areas in the 24 Parganas district as well as far-off tribal areas in districts of Midnapore (West), Bankura,
and Purulia in West Bengal and Singhbhum (East) in Jharkhand. These areas are home to some of the
most impoverished tribes of the country. The whole population suffers from malnutrition and, generation
after generation, people in this belt live a life totally unlit by the lamp of education and in thoroughly sub-
human conditions.
Two main tribes, Sabar and Birhore, are the main beneficiaries of Parivaar's tribal service programs. More
than 300 children from these tribal areas have also been admitted to the Parivaar Ashram Residential
Institution. 500 more children shall be admitted from these areas over the next 2 years. In more than 50
villages (some of which have severe law and order problems) Parivaar has field volunteers and contact
people.
In the last Financial Year, Parivaar raised and spent approximately $ 1,600,000 (about Rs. 8 Crores) on its
various projects as well as infrastructure-development for expansion. Out of this, more than 80% is
through donations from individuals.
Awards and Honours
� National Award for Child Welfare 2011 presented by the Hon. President of India at the
Rashtrapati Bhavan.
� Sanskriti Award 2011, country's premier award for young achievers in 2011 from the Former
President of India Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.
� CNN-IBN's 'Young Indian Leader of the Year Award' for 2012.
� IIM Calcutta's 'Distinguished Alumnus Award' (one of the 9 recipients selected out of 8000
alumni of the institute in last 50 years)
� 'Spirit of Mastek Award' conferred by IT Company Mastek Corporation .
� 'Karmaveer Puraskar' 2011 presented by International Confederation of NGOs
� 'Transforming India through Transforming Indians' felicitation from Chinmaya Mission Kolkata
� Rotary Club of Calcutta Megacity Vocational Excellence Award.
For more details about Parivaar Education Society and its projects, please
Click here.
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