The nominees for our flagship Chagemaker of the Year award have brought about a significant change that has positively impacted our world in recent years.

The nominees for the award are an eclectic mix: they range from a corporate entity to a movement, to a truly federal body, a government department and finally, a group of people who fought long and hard for equality.

Each one of these nominees is worthy of the award. The winner will be announced at the BusinessLine Changemaker Awards, which will be presented on March 15 in New Delhi.

#MeToo : Initially taking social media by storm, India’s #MeToo movement quickly turned into a strident and public conversation about a gamut of transgressions by men in power, ranging from sexual harassment to rape. Starting with revelations from the film industry, the movement reached the top echelons of the executive and even forced a junior minister in the External Affairs Ministry to resign.

Department of Education, Government of Delhi: Breaking conventional notions about government schools, the Delhi government’s Education Department scripted a complete overhaul, ringing in sweeping changes in infrastructure, teacher training and pedagogy, and introducing innovative learning methods. The Delhi government spent 24 per cent of its Budget on education last year and has raised that further to 26 per cent this year.

GST Council: As an example of the perfect coming together of cooperative federalism and an uncomplicated tax regime, the GST Council played a stellar role in uniting multiple State governments with varying political obligations under a ‘one nation, one tax’ system called the Goods and Services Tax. The most remarkable aspect of the functioning of the Council is that it has never had to vote to resolve differences.

Reliance Jio: When Reliance Jioventured into the broadband and digital services space, signing on 100 million subscribers within a mere 170 days of its entry, it disrupted the Indian mobile network space forever. By making it possible for every Indian to access the once exclusive broadband services, Jio pushed up Indian data consumption from 20 crore GB to 120 crore GB a month.

Petitioners against Section 377: In a historic verdict in September 2018, the Supreme Court repealed Section 377 of the IPC, thus quashing a law dating to the colonial era that had cruelly meted out injustice to members of the LGBTQI (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning and Intersex) community on the basis of their sexual orientation.

This landmark legal and, hopefully, socio-cultural victory, followed from the efforts of a group of LGBTQI petitioners who fought for years to overturn the Victorian-era law even as they endured social discrimination.

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