Shri Shridhar Venkat, CEO – The Akshaya Patra Foundation @AkshayaPatra today for Foundation Day Lecture.
As part of the two days celebration of the 29th Foundation Day of Birla Institute of Management and Technology (BIMTECH), Shri Shridhar Venkat of the CEO of the Akshaya Patra Foundation delivered his lecture at the Greater Noida campus on 1st October, 2016. The Akshaya Patra Foundation is a not-for-profit organization headquartered in Bengaluru, India. The organization strives to fight issues like hunger and malnutrition in India, by implementing the Mid-Day Meal Scheme in the government schools and government-aided schools. Serving food, the Akshaya Patra aims not only to fight hunger but also to bring children to school. Akshaya Patra has been continuously leveraging technology to cater to millions of children. Its state-of-the-art kitchens have become a subject of study and have attracted curious visitors from around the world. The organization aims to feed 5 million children everyday by 2020. The welcome address was delivered by Dr. H Chaturvedi, Director of the institute. He spoke about the Mid-Day Meal Scheme and also how the Akshaya Patra foundation has revolutionized it.
Shri Venkat started his lecture by appreciating the vibrancy of the institute and the quote by Mahatma Gandhi – “Be the change you want to see in the word”. He further intrigued the mind of the students by giving them a scenario about how would a child study if he doesn’t get even a single meal a day. Talking about the origin of the foundation, Shridhar Venkat informed the students that Akshaya Patra foundation began with 5 schools and 1500 students and today serve more than a 1.5 million children each day at 27 locations in 10 states. He also talked about the clear dichotomy that exists in the society where India has the fastest growing millionaires and also the largest number of children dying due to diet related issues. He also shared with students some inspiring stories about Savita from Hubli and Bholu from Odisha who aspire to be a public servant and chef respectively.
Talking about the supply chain and distribution aspects, he enriched the students about how Akshaya Patra foundation have made some frugal innovation in order to cater to maximum students with minimum cost. Some of the innovation were the 60000 per hour roti making machine and the sterilizer for utensil produce through the steam out of cooking rice and dal. He informed the management students about the world’s largest kitchen at Hubli and about the sourcing of raw materials for it directly from farms thus eliminating the middlemen. He highlighted the fact that Akshaya Ptra is so efficient and responsive at the same time because they have a mind of a corporate and the heart of NGO.
He closed his lecture by telling students about the appreciations that the organization has received from some of the world renowned personalities like the present and former President of USA Barak Obama and Bill Clinton respectively, former Indian President Dr. Kalam among others.
The vote of thanks was delivered by Dr. Anupam Verma, the deputy director of BIMTECH who highlighted how enriched the students and faculties have been by the lecture.
