The Akshaya Patra Foundation hosted a sold-out Food for Education Benefit Event on Sunday, May 16 at the Westin Hotel in Waltham. The event included a keynote address by the world-renowned Dr. Deepak Chopra, and an astonishing $400,000 was raised to benefit the school lunch program for deserving children in India. The 52-member host committee included influential community members and change agents who were instrumental in making the event a great success.

The event attracted 500 local leaders from diverse professions. The festivities brought in not only long-time supporters, but also many people experiencing their first introduction to Akshaya Patra. Madhu Sridhar, President and CEO of Akshaya Patra, received a thunderous applause when she shared with the guests the Akshaya Patra’s success story and the hope it has brought to millions of children. She urged the crowd to help make poverty history by making sure hunger is not a barrier to education and added, “We are gathered to bring smiles of hope to five million children by 2020, the organization’s next goal.  It is our collective challenge, our collective obligation, our collective responsibility and it will be our collective joy when we meet this next milestone.  We can’t just sit on the sidelines and watch this happen. It is a measure of our humanity.”

Deepak Chopra, MD, a world-renowned authority in the field of mind-body healing, a best-selling author, and the founder of the Chopra Center for Wellbeing, delivered the keynote address. He has been heralded by Time Magazine as one of the top 100 heroes and icons of the century and the "poet-prophet of alternative medicine.” Dr. Chopra addressed the keys to human happiness and said that “the most important way to fulfillment is to make someone else happy.”

In addition to donating money to feed a large school for an entire year on behalf of his grandchildren, the next morning Dr. Chopra wrote on his Twitter account to his over 200,000 followers, “It was a wonderful & humbling experience 2 see so much compassion in action. AKSHAYA PATRA ROCKS!”  At the request of Sridhar, Dr. Chopra graciously agreed to speak for Akshaya Patra once a year in the US.

The event was sponsored by Leader Bank, MFA, Chitika, A123 Systems, Abacus Software, Venus Capital and Deshpande Foundation. New corporations that sponsored the event this year included EMC, CSS, Patni, InteQ and J.P.Morgan. In addition, enthusiastic volunteers from Leader Bank helped the registration process go smoothly for a second year in a row.

The event raised over $400,000. There was a constant flow of donations made during the pledge drive, led by Al Kapoor of Millennium Ventures and Sridhar. Two meal delivery vehicles were sponsored at a cost of over $20,650 each; three large schools were sponsored at a cost of over $12,600 each; two mid-sized schools were sponsored at a cost of over $4,200 each; and 20 small-size schools were sponsored for $1,400 each. The rest of the money raised was for providing healthy meals to deserving children in all eight states in India where Akshaya Patra has kitchens.

“I am overwhelmingly touched by the generosity of all those who are not only keeping their commitment to the Akshaya Patra children year after year but also introducing the Akshaya Patra solution to eradicate hunger and promote education simultaneously to the network of their friends,” said Sridhar. “Organizations that address vital issues and offer a real possibility of bringing about change attract individuals and activists and keep them engaged. Akshaya Patra is doing just that.”

About Akshaya Patra

The Akshaya Patra Foundation is one of the world’s largest NGO-run midday meal programs, feeding 1.2 million children each day in over 7,000 schools through 19 kitchens in eight states in India. A public-private partnership, Akshaya Patra combines good management, innovative technology and smart engineering to deliver school lunch at a fraction of the cost of similar programs in other parts of the world. It costs $28 to feed a child daily for the entire school year. With an average government subsidy of 50 percent, $28 feeds two children. This meal gives these children an incentive to come to school, stay in school and provides them with the necessary nutrients they need to develop their cognitive abilities to focus on learning. The organization also sources its food stocks from local markets, thereby reducing costs associated with transportation and food spoilage while supporting the local economy.

In a short time, the foundation has grown to become the largest, and certainly most innovative, school lunch program in the world. Akshaya Patra is a great example of what can be accomplished when the public sector, private sector and the civic society collaborate-- a cost effective, scalable solution with high quality service delivery. After reaching its goal of feeding one million children each school day, Akshaya Patra’s next milestone is to serve 5 million children daily by 2020. For more information, please visit www.foodforeducation.org.

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