Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation of USA New England chapter held their 7th annual Power of Education event at the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge MA on Feb 29, 2020. Bollywood Vivek Oberoi delivered the keynote address. 

The event opened with a presentation on Ekal by Ranjani Saigal, Executive Director who outlined the progress that Ekal has made over the years. She emphasized the importance of bringing development to Rural India. "70% of India is Rural. There are 640000 villages. Out of that over a 100,000 of them are very remote, very rural" said Saigal. Ekal now has a live and permanent presence  in over 100,000 village. "In addition to running schools =, Ekal is also working in the area of health and skill training" said Saigal.

A video presentation of several New England Ekal Supporters including Udit Batra, CEO of Millipore Sigma, Ram Nehra, Founder of Ekal New England, Puran Dang, Chairman Emeritus, Ekal New England, Prashanth Palakurti, CEO of Reflexes and Anuradha Palakurti, founder of Juju Productions shared their views on why they support Ekal. 

Dr. Subra Dravida, the President of the Ekal New England Chapter discussed the opportunities that technology brings to accelerate change in the villages. "In the first Power of Education held in Boston we came up with the idea of Mobile Computer Vans" said Dravida. Today technology is being integrated into the education and health verticals. There are over 33 Mobile Computer Vans bringing digital literacy into the villages. Over 1200 Ekal schools used tablets in the schools. Telemedicine is also being piloted in many areas. 

Dr. Meena Subramanyam proceeded to discuss many of the special projects that are being spearheaded by people in the New England Area. Dr. Kavita Navani, member of Team Sankalp that helped fundraise for over 200 schools in 2019, talked about the importance of education and the vision of Mahesh Navani and the Navani family to use Solar powered cold storage to improve income for the farmers. Vandana Tiwari Sharma, who has combined her passion for the environment with her passion to support women in rural areas launched a special recyclable bag she had designed and got it tailored from India. "What I like about Ekal is that they take your ideas and work with it"  said Vandana who along with her husband Vivek support an Intergrated Village Development project in Chatha.

Nandini Seetharaman, a sophomore at Williams talked about the dental Telementoring project she is spearheading and also shared a survey on alcohol abuse she had worked on in the villages. 

Vivek Oberoi then took the stage and inspired the audience with powerful keynote address where he discussed why he supports Ekal. . "What I look for is impact. I am careful about the organizations I choose to support. The scale of Ekal is tremendous and it is truly unique in its ability to make a difference" In addition to being a Bollywood Star, Vivek is a philanthropist and successful entrepreneur. He was introduced by a seventh grader. Vamshika Kumar

The evening ended with a pledge drive led by Neeraj Chandra. Sachin Goel, a young entrepreneur shared why he decided to support Ekal. His speech was inspiring.

Dinner was catered by Masala Art. Sound for the evening for provided by Jawed Wahid. Decorations was by TaranaOm . A special shout to Raksha Soni who made a wonderful Step and Repeat Banner. Meena Mehta design all the the print collateral. The highlight of the decorations was spectacular flower arrangements by Minal Akkad. Raj Gupta provided some of the AV for the evening. Latha Krishnan, Amrit Soni, Parveen and Anil Minocha, Anu and Arun Upneja, Rakesh Kapoor, Meena and Sundar Subramanyam, Anil and Ranjani Saigal, Nikita Minocha, Ankita,  Rutty Guzdar, Rishi and Nithi Kapoor, Uma Shinde, Neeraj Chandra, Jharna Madan, Anu and Subra Dravida and Shobana Sampath were part of the core team of volunteers that worked on the event. 

"The fundraising was a huge success" said Dr. Dravida. "However what we are even more pleased to see the interest that so many have in volunteering for Ekal. We look forward to working with everyone to make a big impact"

To learn more about Ekal, please check out their website at http://ekal.org or send an email to ranjani.saigal@ekal.org