PERSONAL SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
SERV'D
Tarun strongly feels, that bringing financial inclusion to people who work in the unorganised sector will not only bring them security, but will also transform their lives by giving them the dignity they deserve. Tarun has made long strides towards achieving this goal by being a patron of Serv’d. Serv'd is a social impact company whose mission is to bring ten million people from the informal sector, into the financial agenda of the country. This is being done by channeling technology to create a footprint for these underprivileged masses. Serv'd is working with non-banking financial companies to make available lines of credit, group insurance and retirement benefits to people working in the informal sector, by making sure that they have access to banking & contractual employment via a mobile app available to the general public. Visit Tarun's blog for more information about Serv'd.
SOCIAL VENTURE PARTNERS
Tarun and Reshma were part of the Pune Chapter of Social Venture Partners, a global company headquartered in Seattle. SVP Pune is engaged in supporting nonprofits in the area of livelihood, education and skill development. SVP provides resources to established nonprofit organisations that are solving huge social issues through innovative ways.
ASHA FOR ASHA
Asha is a maid who worked for Tarun's in-laws. She got into a road accident and injured her leg badly. Neither private nor government hospitals gave her the necessary medical treatment as she did not have health insurance or funds to undergo surgery. By the time Tarun got to hear anything about it, neglect caused severe complications and the doctors advised her to amputate her leg. Tarun feels that just as domestic help make a lifelong commitment to serve any family, the family too has a duty to help domestic workers in their time of need. Tarun got Asha admitted to a super-speciality hospital which undertook a very complicated surgery. Unfortunately the surgical procedure and the subsequent rehabilitation cost lacs of rupees. Tarun therefore ran a social media campaign wherein many people donated generously to save Asha's leg. More than half of the medical costs were borne by Tarun's in-laws. Tarun hopes that more families would feel empathetic about the conditions of their domestic workers and work towards improving them. Due to the efforts of everyone involved, Asha now has a prosthetic leg and is mobile again.
CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
PRAYAS
Tarun believes that a woman is at the core of any family and that healthcare starts with her; especially amongst rural and poor communities. It has been observed that if the woman falls sick due to any critical illness, the family usually goes into steep debt leading to an unstable family environment.
Hence BMC Software partnered with Prayas to screen three thousand and five hundred underprivileged women for cervical cancer in Maharashtra. At the time of updating this website, seventy-eight women were diagnosed with cancer and treated successfully.
The success of the fight against cervical cancer is dependent on awareness and education. Hence sessions devoted to the awareness of cervical cancer detection, prevention and treatment were also organised. BMC Software also provided an ambulance to Prayas to establish last mile connectivity in rural and remote areas.
LILA POONAWALLA FOUNDATION
Tarun has always advocated the need to educate girls in a family as a path towards transforming the whole family.
With this goal in mind BMC embarked on a journey with the Lila Poonawalla Foundation to empower girl students with high potential and outstanding academics, through scholarship to pursue higher education for four years.
Fifty girls received scholarship for engineering classes and skill development workshops as part of this programme. This engagement with the foundation is a multi-year commitment by BMC. Of the fifty scholarships awarded, ten engineering students received funding for the course duration of four years. Others students received scholarships of rupees fifty thousand each for the course duration of three years.
LIGHTING UP SAKUR
Tarun believes in 'gaining by saving' and in 2011, he initiated a project to replace lighting fixtures in BMC's Pune office with higher efficiency LED lamps resulting in over 65% savings in power. A portion of these savings was donated to a remote village outside of Sakur, India to bring "New Life After Dusk" by lighting the streets & homes of the villagers. Access to power helped transform the lives of such communities who still had no access to basic infrastructure. BMC created a sustainable solution to the power woes of such a remote location by making sure that the equipment donated worked on solar energy.
JAGRITI
Tarun has always believed in transforming lives through skill development and training. Three visually impaired girls who had applied for housekeeping jobs from Jagriti School for Blind Girls, were instead hired and trained in software testing, soft skills, written & verbal communication and English language. This not only allowed the girls to work on software products at BMC, but also enabled them to aspire for and chase larger goals. These women later got great opportunities at multinational banks which changed the direction of their lives.
BMC also funded the setting up of a school building and other infrastructure in Alandi for visually impaired girls. Regular visits were undertaken to assess the infrastructure and to provide quality education & counselling.
Efforts were taken to develop skills which would become means to earn livelihoods for the girls.
Tarun feels that funding initiatives is not the only method of creating change in the society. Making non-financial effort is equally important.
With this philosophy guiding its strategy, BMC set out of a drive where employees donated their time to assemble school kits. More than ten thousand kits were donated in five years to underprivileged children through the Seva Sahayog School Kit programme.
These children thus got access to stationary, books and writing material which otherwise would have been outside of their reach.
SEVA SAHAYOG
GLOBAL RUN FOR CHARITY
Tarun has always stressed on the need for individuals to stay fit. And since running is one of the easiest ways to remain healthy and active, it was important to encourage people to take up and go running regularly. This was done by tying up 'running' with a charitable cause.
Global Run For Charity was started by BMC Software to help raise funds for charitable causes while enhancing employee well-being. BMC Software donates $10 for every runner who completes the event. Employees are encouraged to bring family & friends to the run to raise awareness and generate funds by participation. In the year 2016, more than two thousand employees ran the marathon and helped raise funds for a school construction program to create better learning facilities in two Zila Parishad Schools.
In three years since its inception, the run has supported three different projects in the field of education on a large-scale. This year in October, Global Run will support a cause to detect and prevent cervical cancer among rural women.
USHATAI LOKHANDE TRUST
Causes related to education are close to Tarun's heart and under his leadership, BMC partnered with the Ushatai Lokhande Trust to fund the construction of two schools and setting up of an industrial training centre. Global leaders attended the inauguration of the technical centre, planted trees and interacted with the students in Sangise village near Kamshet. The technical centre would train more than one hundred students every year. Nutritional support was also provided to one hundred and twenty students which drastically reduced the dropout rate.
CREATING BETTER SCHOOLS
In keeping with Tarun's vision of facilitating education, BMC Software worked with the Rotary Riverside Club of Pune to enhance educational infrastructure at Zilla Parishad schools in Maharashtra. BMC supported three Zilla Parishad schools by setting up computer labs, painting classrooms, building furniture, building washrooms, repairing existing facilities, electrifying powerless areas, providing fixtures & fittings, paving pathways, levelling gardens & playgrounds and by creating drinking water facilities. This drastically changed the environment in which the students were learning and had a decisive impact on the attendance of more than a thousand students.
GREEN PUNE
Tarun's emphasis throughout his life has been on 'sustainable development'. And the need to protect and preserve the environment for the survival of future generations is one of the key things on his 'most important' list.
With this mission in mind, BMC launched an initiative with Greenthumb for the desilting and preservation of Khadakwasla backwaters. Teams from BMC visited Greenthumb Nature Trail and planted hundreds of indigenous trees to stop soil erosion. Funds were also raised for conservation efforts.