The Hindu Business Line : Fostering entrepreneurship in social sector

All the three are led by `social entrepreneurs', who possess the vision, creativity and determination of business entrepreneurs. And these qualities are not solely for the wealth creation but to introduce new solutions to social problems.

These individuals with innovative and practical ideas for solving social problems, include Mr Paul Basil, Mr Pradeep Ghosh and Mr Vineet Rai, who narrated their experiences at a meeting titled `Celebrating Social Entrepreneurship', organised by Dr Reddy's Foundation and Ashoka Global on Friday.

RIN is working as an incubator for rural innovations and helping them transform into enterprises and wealth creation. Mr Basil believes that rural people understand their environments and create thousands of innovations with potential to improve the well being of the rural population.

"What rural innovators don't have though is access to the skills, networks and other resources needed to take their innovations to the market. RIN believes many rural innovations can be successfully commercialised as micro- enterprises that benefit rural consumers and contribute to sustainable wealth creation.

"Once a model is established to transform ideas with potential into reality, a virtuous cycle comes in to operation, encouraging further innovation and wealth creation in rural areas," Mr Basil says.

Realising that raising commercial finance was one of the most critical activities in establishing a successful micro-enterprise, RIN has focused on forging ties with venture capital firms that operate with rigorous commercial discipline.

It was at this juncture that Avishkaar, a Mumbai-based micro-venture capital fund, joined hands with RIN in supporting the innovation-based micro enterprises.

According to Mr Vineet Rai, the partnership has already paid off with Avishkaar investing in Servals Automation Ltd, the manufacturer of the rain gun and burner innovations, identified and nurtured by RIN.

"Avishkaar intends to transform nascent rural ideas into coherent business entities by funnelling resources at the point and time where it can be most effective so that the change spreads at the roots of the rural Indian society and blooms upward," Mr Rai said.

Targeting similar changes at the roots of rural Indian society, Oasis is working at establishing community-led self-sustaining and self-sufficient social security system.

According to Mr Pradeep Ghosh, Oasis had modelled the system in such a manner that even the poorest of the poor gets complete social security through insurances and old-age pension, without paying for the premiums or the need for savings. "The model also shows how social security can lead to sustained economic growth," Mr Ghosh says.

Drawing several parallels between the business entrepreneurs and social entrepreneurs, the Vice-Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Dr Reddy's Lab, Mr G.V. Prasad, urged the corporate houses to join hands with social entrepreneurs in effectively realising their corporate social responsibility and in achieving faster and larger social changes.

Stating that the most successful entrepreneurs across the globe were not motivated by the wealth creation alone, he said what inspired them more was the social impact.

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