Rusen Kumar, Founder and Editor, India CSR in the SEEP national seminar
“Social entrepreneurs are not content just to give a fish or teach how to fish. They will not rest until they have revolutionized the fishing industry.”
India CSR News Network
NEW DELHI: Social Entrepreneurship is the answer to social development, especially in a country like India which has so much skew in terms of economic equality. Not only India, social entrepreneurship is what is required today for the sustainable development of human beings all around the globe.
It was in this context that Birla Institute of Management Technology (BIMTECH) had a seminar on enthusing the university and other academic systems to sensitize the youth. The inaugural session was presided by eminent speakers like Pradeep Kashyap, founder and CEO at MART, Sameer Chaturvedi, Head – Social Enterprise (India) at British Council, and Dr Ashish Dwivedi, Deputy Director at Hull University Business School. Dr Harivansh Chaturvedi, Director and Dr Rahul Singh, Faculty at BIMTECH represented BIMTECH at the dais.
The session began with the question What is a social enterprise?, and how it could be the answer to social development. All present on the dais emphasized on the fact that in the world it is entrepreneurs, who are trying to bring in change and it is these young budding social entrepreneurs who find the answers to such questions. It requires the compassion of these entrepreneurs and also the co – operation of the government so as to achieve the goals of social entrepreneurship. This would in turn lead to the achievement of the sustainable development goals set by the United Nations.
Sameer Chaturvedi from British Council presented the overview of the Social Enterprise Ecosystem, which British Council is driving in many countries. He spoke about the success of Social Enterprise Project in the 28 different countries it has been operating in. The project now has partnerships of over 150 enterprises and 1500 social entrepreneurs. He stressed about how Social Entrepreneurship unified people by combining cultures. Social Entrepreneurship had helped in fostering a more sustainable and prosperous future for all. He also spoke about how the social enterprise ecosystem was contributing towards the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals of 2030.
Chaturvedi also spoke about Social Enterprise Ecosystem in India. He mentioned that the Young Women Social Enterprise Development Program was a grand success. Moving on to what British Council was doing under the Social Enterprise Education Programme (SEEP). He said that they now had 10 partners in India involved in the project, of which BIMTECH was an academic partner and was contributing to the project by doing the most difficult job of convincing academic institutions to have Social Entrepreneurship as one of their main courses in their curriculum. He also stressed upon the need for the establishment of dedicated legislations and policies for the promotion of Social Enterprise and Social Entrepreneurship in India.
Pradeep Kashyap, Founder and CEO, MART addressing the gathering of SEEP national seminar. Dias includes Sameer Chaturvedi, British Council; Dr H Chaturvedi, Director BIMTECH; Dr Ashish Dwivedi, Hull University; Dr Abha Rishi and Dr Rahul Singh, Seminar Chairs
He said that for the successful development of Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship, sustainable business model needs be developed and for the sustenance of Social Enterprise Ecosystem government legislation, mentoring, funding, grassroots outreach, academic participation, and service feedback are required.
The detailing of the project was taken further by Dr Rahul Singh, who talked about how the project on Mainstreaming University and the Social Enterprise Ecosystem was being taken up by BIMTECH. He also talked about how the conceptualization started with looking at integral humanism and neo-liberalism being the ground realities for any social enterprise.
Pradeep Kashyap defined to the audience what a Social Enterprise is all about, from his perspective. He started with the Wikipedia definition of Social Enterprise and proceeded to giving his own definition to Social Enterprise using his own organization Mart, as an example. He defined Social Enterprise as an organization which has a business mind and a social heart, which is also the motto of his organization.
According to him, a combination of social mind and a social heart would form an NGO, a combination of a social mind and a business heart is what a government tries to forge and a combination of a business mind and a business heart is a corporate and finally the combination of a business mind and a social heart is what is defined as a Social Enterprise.
He then went on to give the principles of Social Enterprise as:
1. What is good for the society is what is good for the organization.
2. Profits come from passion and purpose
3. Servant leadership
4. Encourage emotional intelligence and intuitive wisdom
5. Human beings come first – managers last.
He concluded his talk by emphasizing on the development of a strong bond between students and professors which would help in bringing about a change in young entrepreneurs to become social entrepreneurs, who would in turn lead to the establishment of good Social Enterprises and good Social Enterprises mean change would be fast.
Rusen Kumar, founder and Managing Editor of India CSR Network and a seasoned professional having very strong ties across globes, presented his concept and discussed about India CSR Social Enterprise Assessment Survey. He said, as per survey social enterprise is spirit to help with limited resources. He says that if a person who does not have resources but still want to help others within his capability and limited resources than this spirit is social enterprise. The survey says that understanding of social enterprise is limited in corporate, social institutions and government, especially in absence of legal statement. However, all these stakeholders look towards a more clear operational model of social enterprises and they appreciate it more than non-government organisations on learning from the global experiences.
A number of perspectives emerged in the general discussion which revolved around the requirement of dedicated government policies for the promotion of Social Enterprise. This question was finally answered by taking the example of how US was supporting Social Enterprises by giving organizations credits if they had a Social Enterprise model in their business.
