What is it like to dedicate one's life to working for some of the most under-represented groups? Nandita Pradhan Bhatt is the Director of the Martha Farrell Foundation, an NGO that supports informal, migrant workers, mostly female domestic workers and adolescent children to build their leadership and collective voice against injustice. Nandita has been a civil society practitioner decades, and has worked extensively on gender inclusion and the prevention of sexual harassment against women. In th...
Feb 01, 2024•49 min•Season 3Ep. 4
After a short year end break, No-Cost Extension is back! In the first episode of 2024, Deval sits down with Deep Jyoti Sonu Brahma , co-founder of Farm2Food Foundation . Deep speaks of his early years growing up and studying in Arunachal Pradesh, the impact the turbulent times in the North Eastern region had on him and later experiences with people led movements like the Narmada Bachao Andolan. His journey lead him back to Assam with a desire to work with young people and communities and place t...
Jan 18, 2024•52 min•Season 3Ep. 3
Revathi Radhakrishnan is the founder-director of the Vanavil Trust, a non profit founded in 2004 that supports children of two Nomadic communities: Boom Boom Mattikarars and Narikuravars, in Tamil Nadu. After 17 years of working with the communities, Vanavil now has grown into an organisation that works in child protection, health and nutrition, holistic education and livelihoods. As a child, Revathi was a vociferous reader, devouring whatever books she could lay her hands on. She had to give up...
Dec 14, 2023•44 min•Season 3Ep. 2
Season 3 of No-Cost Extension kicks off with host Deval Sanghavi in conversation with Dhruv Lakra, founder and CEO of Mirakle Couriers, a for- profit courier service that employs low income deaf adults thereby delinking charity with disability. Dhruv grew up in Kashmir before moving to Mumbai for college, after a brief stint as an investment banker he joined Dasra as one of the organisation’s first team members in 2004. He then went on to become a Skoll scholar at the Said School of Business, Ox...
Nov 30, 2023•48 min•Season 3Ep. 1
Deval Sanghavi is back with a new season of No-Cost Extension! In this season Deval’s talking to some of the most committed social leaders from India and around the world on what it’s like to work towards the challenging goal of equity. Deval and his guests also speak about what it is like to run organizations post COVID, bootstrapping and entrepreneurship, the work of philanthropy, and what it is like to work with the most marginalized and excluded communities. Episodes drop November 30, 2023! ...
Nov 24, 2023•2 min•Season 3Ep. 1
How does it all begin? Was there a singular experience or encounter that sparked a desire to work on social change? How do you go from being affected by an issue, to contributing a few times, to the realisation that there is more to this? - that working in social change could be the calling, or the profession, and how do you go from that to wanting to build an organisation and so much more? In this No-Cost Extension special, we combed through our two seasons to bring you inspiring origin stories...
Jun 30, 2023•25 min•Season 2Ep. 18
Over the past two seasons, host Deval Sanghavi has talked about the idea of impact with his guests: what does it mean and what should it mean? How can we further our understanding of social impact? From the archives we bring you Donald Lobo of the Chintu Gudiya Foundation, Karen Doff of Sharanam Centre for Girls, Safeena Hussain of Educate Girls and Ravi Chopra and Jo McGowan Chopra from the Latika Royal foundation talking about impact and scale and how they look at these as individuals and orga...
Jun 01, 2023•15 min•Season 2Ep. 17
Gagan Sethi is the founder of Janvikas, an NGO that has worked in the space of holistic human development for over three decades. Gagan has helped set up several strategic organizations in the country, like Kutch Mahila Vikas Sangathan, Sahjeevan, Drishti, Centre for Social justice and the HID forum. In this episode of No-Cost Extension, Deval and Gagan talk about disaster relief work, what happens when there’s discrimination in relief work and the toll working in the development sector takes on...
May 17, 2023•35 min•Season 2Ep. 16
Loren Cardeli is the Executive Director at A Growing Culture , a non profit that believes in food sovereignty for everyone everywhere and works with farmers to ensure they decide what to grow, where to grow it and who to sell it to. Deval and Loren met at a Synergos retreat and found they had much to talk about and bond over, prompting Deval to invite Loren on to No-Cost Extension as a guest. Listen to Loren talk about his growing years in New York City in a family that loved to argue, what made...
May 03, 2023•49 min•Season 2Ep. 15
We're pausing our regular programming on No-Cost Extension with Deval Sanghavi to bring you this panel discussion from Dasra Philanthropy Week 2023. Deval will be back next week with a new guest! The Going Platinum: Past, Present and Future of Civil Society in India @ 75 report is a collective effort by India’s leading non-profits to showcase and celebrate civil society's contribution to India's development. The conversation at DPW 2023 was based on the report and spanned policy, service deliver...
Apr 20, 2023•32 min•Season 2Ep. 14
Sonal Shah has spent her career both in the private and public sector, including stints with Goldman Sachs, Google.org and The White House. She is currently the CEO of The Texas Tribune , a politics and public policy-specific news organization. But before embarking on her illustrious career, many years ago, Sonal and Deval were just two teenagers forced to wake up early and help clean up the Gandhi Centre in Houston, Texas after community events. In this episode of No-Cost Extension, Sonal and D...
Apr 04, 2023•39 min•Season 2Ep. 13
Jo McGowan and Ravi Chopra met in the 70s and fell in love through the post. They got married and moved to India in the early 80s and have since dedicated their lives to serving the communities they live in, albeit in very different ways. From helping set up The Front for Rapid Economic Advancement of India (FREA) to working with the Centre for Science and Environment to setting up the People’s Science Institute in Uttarakhand, Ravi Chopra has spent his life using science and technology to bette...
Mar 22, 2023•48 min•Season 2Ep. 12
How do you begin to break intergenerational cycles of poor health and violence in a megapolis? What evidence based models of urban health interventions can we look to? Content Warning: This episode contains mentions of violence that some listeners may find disturbing and listener discretion is advised. In this episode of No-Cost Extension, Deval sits down with Dr. Armida Fernandez , founder-trustee of SNEHA Mumbai (Society for Nutrition, Education and Health Action) and the organisation’s CEO Va...
Mar 09, 2023•48 min•Season 2Ep. 11
Dasra Philanthropy Week is an annual gathering of diverse stakeholders and voices from the development ecosystem to convene, converse and continue sustained action towards the quest for a billion Indians to thrive with dignity and equity. As the 14th edition of Dasra Philanthropy Week 2023 gets underway, No-Cost Extension presents DPW specials: conversations that we believe will be of interest to our listeners. This episode is a conversation between Suparna Gupta , founder of Aangan Trust , and ...
Feb 23, 2023•21 min•Season 2Ep. 10
How can we engage with policymakers in a timely and effective way? What can we do to address the power imbalance between the Global North and the Global South? Why does global philanthropy set aside only 2% of funding for the climate? In this episode of No-Cost Extension, Deval Sanghavi has a freewheeling conversation with Alberto Lidji, Founder of the Do One Better Knowledge Hub and Podcast. Alberto talks about his shift from working with private corporations to the world of philanthropy, why h...
Feb 09, 2023•38 min•Season 2Ep. 9
How can we challenge the top-down approach to solving social problems? Can we build bridges between powerful sectors and community organisations? What role does sustained inner work play in serving with love? Deval sits down with Peggy Dulany, Founder & Chair of Synergos, a global organisation helping dismantle systems that create the most urgent problems of our time: poverty, social injustice, and climate change From absorbing ideas about philanthropy ‘through her skin’ at dinner table conv...
Jan 26, 2023•44 min•Season 2Ep. 8
How should funders be rethinking philanthropy in the wake of the pandemic? How can they take their egos out of the equation? How can they operate with a greater sense of urgency, transparency, and trust with grantee centric mechanisms? In this episode of No-Cost Extension, Deval Sanghavi sits down with Lior Ipp , the CEO of the Roddenberry Foundation that is inspired by the life and legacy of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry who believed that human potential is remarkable and would lead us to ...
Dec 14, 2022•39 min•Season 2Ep. 7
The Rebuild India Fund will support 1000 small community based organizations in the next decade through flexible funding and capacity building, enabling them to survive and thrive. How do committees select organizations for funding? What is it like to be on a selection committee? What can we learn and unlearn from the hundreds of small organizations doing meaningful work across the country? What can we do better next time? In this second episode of the Rebuild Conversations, Deval Sanghavi catch...
Nov 24, 2022•20 min•Season 2Ep. 6
When COVID-19 hit, it made clear the undeniable fact of just how vulnerable our poorest communities are. It was a setback of huge proportions, creating a crisis that extended well beyond health to impact on work and livelihoods, education, access to food and nutrition. It exposed how a shock in any one area can snowball pushing communities deeper into poverty. Many small grassroots organizations were the primary support for communities in the worst phases of the pandemic. The Rebuild India Fund ...
Nov 24, 2022•15 min•Season 2Ep. 5
How can community philanthropy grow organically in a way that serves the community, unlocking its potential? Why do we use the word risk so much in philanthropy? How can family philanthropies involve the next gen meaningfully in their work? Deval Sanghavi , host of No-Cost Extension Pod sits down with Maya Patel, the CEO of The Tarsadia Foundation , a family philanthropy working both in India and the United States in health and human services, economic empowerment and education. In 2016, the Nat...
Nov 10, 2022•46 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Can urban discard be used as a tool to alleviate poverty? How can the poor be involved in evolving their own solutions with dignity? Why must we focus on the receiver’s dignity instead of the donor’s pride? In this episode of No-Cost Extension, host Deval Sanghavi speaks to Anshu and Meenakshi Gupta, co-founders of Goonj . Goonj aims to build an equitable relationship of strength, sustenance and dignity between the cities and villages using the under-utilized urban material as a tool to trigger ...
Oct 26, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 2Ep. 3
How can loving a sport lead someone to found an NGO? How can we empower young people to make their own life decisions, rather than giving them solutions? What is the secret to scaling such social initiatives across the world and what changes can one hope to see from the Indian social sector funding landscape? In the first episode of season 2, Deval Sanghavi speaks to Matthew Spacie , the founder of Magic Bus , an NGO that works with children and young people in India taking them on a journey fro...
Sep 29, 2022•48 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Deval Sanghavi is back with another season of No-Cost Extension, ready to engage more deeply with the theme of rebuilding. Through conversations with social leaders, small NGOs and voices from philanthropies, Season 2 will focus on rebuilding communities, rebuilding India, and rebuilding the fabric of our society. The first episode drops next week! For more information on NCE go to dasra.org/nce and follow Deval on Twitter at @Deval_Sanghavi and @Dasra...
Sep 14, 2022•2 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Safeena Husain , the founder of Educate Girls , an NGO that works to support girls’ education across India. Educate Girls has just completed 14 years, and during this period they have grown from working with fifty schools to working in over 18,000 villages across India and reaching millions of children. Safeena talks about her own personal journey that led her to set up Educate Girls and how they learnt to use machine learning to identify the most vulnerable locations to...
Dec 06, 2021•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Aakash Sethi , the CEO of Quest Alliance , a non-profit organization that equips young people with 21st century skills. Aakash shares what it was like to grow up in a family dedicated to development work, what it means to him to build for a world where young people feel empowered and included, how to grow from loss and the impact of COVID-19 on education in India. They also chat about how Quest has become one of the best places in the development sector to work in, and t...
Nov 23, 2021•1 hr 10 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Anu Aga and Meher Pudumjee , a mother and daughter philanthropic team who are deeply committed to equity and inclusion. While many families grapple with intergenerational philanthropy, Anu and Meher are examples of how different perspectives can come together to shape a long-lasting philanthropic engagement. Anu Aga has been a trailblazing corporate leader when there were a few like her. She has led the energy and environment business Thermax Ltd. Anu is a social worker,...
Nov 11, 2021•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 8
This special episode is a conversation between Deval and Hansal Mehta that took place earlier this year at Dasra Philanthropy Week . Listen in as Hansal speaks to Deval about his perspectives on philanthropy, what he believes is real impact, and his lockdown beard. Hansal Mehta is a well-known National Award winning filmmaker, director, and writer. Some of his well-known films are Shahid, City Lights, and more recently, the web series Scam 1992. Hansal is a longtime friend of the development sec...
Sep 28, 2021•43 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Vineet Rai , the Founder and Chairman of Aavishkaar Group, a leading global impact investment platform. Although they have very different perspectives when it comes to development and social change, they share a long friendship that goes back to their early years in the development sector. Listen in as Vineet and Deval talk about the shared idealism that shapes their values, their history of travelling together across the country to learn and understand how issues play o...
Sep 14, 2021•51 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Sharda Nirmal, the founder of the Sharanam Center, a home for girls in Dharavi, Mumbai, and Karen Doff, the founder of the Aasha Foundation and a longtime collaborator of the centre. The Sharanam Center is not an institution - it is a home. Sharda talks about how she established the Sharanam Center as a young woman and with her husband over twenty years ago. Karen first encountered Sharanam as a visitor, but soon became a close collaborator, working with Sharda, and find...
Aug 31, 2021•52 min•Season 1Ep. 5
Deval Sanghavi speaks to Donald Lobo , one of India's most unassuming philanthropists. Listen in as Lobo deftly steers the conversation away from the Rolling Stones article he was featured in, and as he talks about his giving philosophy and why he trusts organizations that are truly embedded in communities, what people think the terms impact and scale mean versus what they should mean, and why Lobo’s hopeful about the Indian social sector. (42:39) ” If you're doing something for the public good,...
Aug 16, 2021•51 min•Season 1Ep. 4
