Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) India, a leading not-for-profit organization is a part of the global network of CAF organizations. Initially established in the United Kingdom about 100 years back, this organization has been supporting donors and other not-for-profit organizations in engaging themselves in the socio-developmental issues across the world. Their mission has been to promote and support ‘strategic giving’ for a more equitable and sustainable society. Since the middle class population was gradually increasing in the developing countries like Russia, South Africa, Brazil, India etc., despite many challenges, the philosophy of ‘giving’ was also increasing.

Simultaneously the wealth in the developed nations was increasing and a lot of donors came forward to extend their support to poorer economies like India. Hence the Indian arm of CAF was set up as an independent entity with distinct governance, after a discussion with the local stakeholders. Since then, CAF India, with its dedicated team of experts, have brought in development sector knowledge and experience to instil the culture of 'Giving' to a larger number of individual and corporate donors, and philanthropists. Today CAF India has been instrumental in providing a lot of donor info, policy and donation advisory through their credibility and due diligence system, in the space of social work. CAF India has been a pioneer in this domain and have been helping the corporates and other social bodies in improvising their Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives, to become better institutions.

CAF India specializes in providing an end-to-end solution to individual and corporate donors and philanthropists. The organization caters to the specific needs of every donor and the NGO, while they try to devise a customized approach for each of them, across sectors and geographies. All these programs are designed keeping in mind the industry best practices along with the user experiences for a long-term sustainability.  Several local bodies or communities like the Panchayat or the Government are involved, to enable a long-term program implementation.

The organization is one of the most credible names in CSR. Right from conceptualization of a CSR programme, to its implementation, management, monitoring and evaluation; CAF India’s dedicated team does it all with utmost honesty and integrity. In fact, CAF India has drafted the CSR standards for the Bureau of Indian Standards, which will go a long way in addressing challenges in social development sector.

There are two types of Programs for the individual or corporate donors, namely the Payroll Giving Program and the Retail or Individual Giving program:

- Payroll Giving Program – CAF India believes in the philosophy of ‘Give as You Earn’, which entails every company or its employees to donate to the NGOs in an easy and tax efficient manner. To date, they have been successful in serving more than 27,000 corporates in making their community investments.

- Individual Giving Program – Individual donors have the leverage to donate in cash or kind to serve the society.

CAF India works with some of the most credible NGOs in India, which have gone through the organisation’s rigorous validation process. This NGO validation process has been referred to and sourced by different organisations, including the Planning Commission, as well as many corporate and industry associations to set up their own systems of accreditation. Multiple not-for-profit organisations have approached CAF India for validations. Thus, the organisation has a demonstrated track-record of conducting validation of NGOs for international foundation, trans-national corporates and HNIs. The process involves an impartial and robust assessment of credentials, capacity and track record of NGOs.

The organization also focuses on collaboration between the global donors so that they can benefit from each other’s live cases and experiences in order to arouse awareness and get a broader insight into the type of social services being rendered, for a sustainable period of time. These multi-faceted programs cater to individual needs globally keeping their business acumen in mind, which instigates the corporates to be keen in diversified yet comprehensive programs. Overseas volunteers also get motivated to donate in these ‘Giving Programs’ aimed at a long term socio-economic development.

CAF has set a global footprint in ten countries like Australia, Canada, UK, Russia, Turkey, India, Brazil, South Africa, Bulgaria and the United States of America, while further expansion plans are in the pipeline. CAF India plays a vital role in the growth and development of the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) globally, since its inception 22 years ago. CAF India is in close alliance with CAF Global Alliance in formulating and implementing several policies in a more focussed manner as they have a close-knit association with the NGOs and the underprivileged classes locally, thereby understanding their plight better.

CAF focuses on the emerging market and has a sub-group comprising of Russia, Turkey, Bulgaria, India and South Africa. India plays a vital role in the strategy and policy formulation for Global Alliance along with the other member countries.

COVID-19 pandemic evoked the spirit of ‘Giving’ even more amongst the donors of CAF India. The onset of the global pandemic since March 2020 has led to public health emergency especially for the elderly and the children, while impacting the livelihoods of the entire nation, especially the unorganized sector. The Indian philanthropists and corporates came forward to provide all forms of physical and financial support for the vulnerable groups and migrant population by creating more awareness and precautionary measures.In the initial days, PPE kits, masks, shoe-covers, sanitizers, headgears and ventilator support were provided especially to the front-line workers and lockdown workers, as they were at major life risk.

CAF India mobilized over ₹17.35 Crore with support from 28 companies across 19 Indian states through 50 implementation partners, reaching out to a population of. 

Over the past few months they reached out to 2.6 million people, which included, construction workers, frontline workers (medical, sanitation, police personnel); municipal corporations;state health departments(of Punjab, Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala);rural communities (daily wagers, disabled population, elderly households, artisans etc.); and urban slum wagers.

Loss of livelihood for many led to their children being rendered suspended from schools, so CAF India made all the effort to support them by providing some relief to these children, men and women. Raising awareness for cleanliness and vaccination has been their mission currently and they will continue to support the masses with Governmental and Corporate interventions.

CAF India provided unprecedented support to the ‘Cyclone Amphan’ victims in East India, that spanned over a period ranging from two weeks to three months. Rehabilitation was meted out to them and were being taken care of till the time they have recovered well enough to look after themselves.CAF India appealed to individuals and corporates to generously donate for their food, shelter, clothing and basic necessities, thereby impacting the needy positively.

CAF India’s main focus over the next one to two years will be to continue to serve the masses with adequate support from the philanthropists, donors and corporates in the most optimal way. CAF India has been working closely with several corporates and NGOs to devise the most suitable strategies to suffice funding goals especially to support the not-for-profit organizations, which were highly impacted due to the pandemic and the amendment of FCRA laws.

Social work in remote areas needs to be encouraged further and initiatives like mobile vans etc. have been operational to ensure that work can be continued in those areas. Donation opportunities have been planned for individual donors both in terms of their time and monetary support. They will continue to motivate students to help the NGOs with voluntary work, thereby channelizing their skills and energy in the best possible manner.

Some socio-economic developmental activities have been initiated in clusters like Eastern Rajasthan to focus on education, climate change and health, involving extensive engagement from the local stakeholders and organizations. Collaboration with experts in these fields will bring about more integrated long-term developmental work to bring about a radical shift in the lives of the people. This program will entail the utilisation of local resources and businesses to bring about the change domestically. There are factories of larger corporates in these areas which will play a pivotal role along with the other eminent and resourceful stakeholders.

CAF India’s philanthropic initiatives have been instrumental in driving success for the masses so far. Their ever successful ‘Giving’ programs will continue to strike the right chords of life for the not so privileged clusters, pan India. 

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Impact-Story is a series on development and CSR interventions leading to some impacts on the ground. If you have a project, innovation or intervention that has changed the lives of a few people or a community, please share a brief note at shilpi@csrbox.org. Our Team will get back to you after validating the information for a detailed coverage.