Given a chance, we all would love to give back to the society we live in. However, most of us fail to take the time out of our hectic professional work-life to walk the extra mile. And this is what exactly sets apart this 25-year-old young Bengaluru girl from the rest of us.
In a candid conversation with LifeBeyondNumbers, Harshitha Srinivas shares how she has been able to become the ‘change’ she wants to bring in to the world. Besides being a full-time associate of Accenture, for more than the last 5-years, she has immersed herself into social services which include several campaigns and drives targeting underprivileged children, distressed women, helpless elderlies as well as civic awareness.
“I give time for my social services on weekends and sometimes even on weekdays before my office shift starts. My family has been supporting me and that helps me to balance both my professional and social work. There are people who have asked how do I even manage all this for which I have always replied ‘will power’. Service has always been my passion,” says Harshitha.
The moment of truth
Harshitha always aspired to join the police services, following the footsteps of her role-model, Kiran Bedi (India’s first female IPS officer). However, circumstances didn’t allow her to walk in that direction. She still wishes to emulate Bedi as a person and continues to get inspired by her life experiences and deeds.
She credits NCC(National Cadet Corps) for getting motivated to take up social services work. “Dolly Paul was my ANO at that time when one day we had to visit specially-abled children’s home and it was my first experience to see them. Seeing the way sisters took care of those kids, it made me think that there are soo many children who need us and all they need is love and someone to listen. This incidence moved me so much that after that, I started visiting children’s homes, old age homes, and spent time with them which gave me soo much of happiness, and that’s how it all started,” she said. Harshitha continued visiting them even as a college student and also taught children in her free-time and interacted with the abused women for understanding the depth of their issues.
People for Passion – A step towards positive change
By investing her small savings, in January 2020, Harshitha registered an NGO, People for Passion, to uplift the marginalized sections of the society. The universe found its way into its sustenance as people started to associate with her noble cause. The current strength of the organization is 10+ members and more than 40 volunteers are supporting them.
“Our main motto is to bring in a positive change in society through our service. We work for issues related to women, children, specially-abled, LGBT community, environment, and the downtrodden. We have organized more than 40 events so far which has benefitted many,” Harshitha told us with much pride.
Amidst these difficult times of Coronavirus, the organization launched a campaign, titled Hunger to Hope. Under this flagship campaign, Harshitha and her team of 10-member volunteer’s group reached close to 4000 beneficiaries by distributing thousands of dry grocery kits and food packets among the needy. Looking beyond human needs, she was not only motivated to spread awareness regarding animal care, but also her team actively participated in feeding at least 500 stray animals in the middle of the Covid-19 crisis.
Apart from campaigns related to children and their education, People For Passion has also catered to the needs of abused women, elderlies, sexual minorities and has worked towards community services like blood donation drives, health check-ups for elders, polio elimination, and cleanliness and other awareness initiatives. She considers imparting dancing and English language skills among children and elderlies are some of the enjoyable and fulfilling parts of her work.
The way forward
In the future, she aims to form an advocacy network particularly dealing with women’s rights and violence against women.
Though she has already been conferred with several prestigious awards like Eastern Bhoomika Women Iconic Award 2020, ‘Jana Seva Rathna’ award, Social impact award 2019, Star Rotarian award, etc. for her remarkable contributions in the field of social work, these are only the jewels of her bright crown of hope, love, and compassion. She feels that these recognitions have added to her responsibilities- “This is just the beginning and I still have a long way to go”.
Amid all the uncertainties of life, she strongly believes that “love and compassion are all that is needed to make this world a better place”. As an ardent believer of Mother Teresa’s philosophy of ‘feeding at least a person, if not a hundred’, she is certain of small individual efforts contributing towards the betterment of the society. In her words, “In the end, you just need the magic of kindness and love to make this world beautiful. A small act of kindness is the key to hope and faith. So let’s make that difference and spread Magic across.”
How are you planning to spread the magic across?