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Ringing in change:Social entrepreneurs gearing to change India

Jacinta D'Souza Bangalore, Jun 29 (PTI) Social entrepreneurship is expected to be the next big thing to influence India as the country juggles to achieve a balance between a growing GDP growth, ensuring inclusive growth and attempting to address issues ranging from education, energy efficiency to climate change. "A social entrepreneur is an amalgamation of values displayed in Mother Teresa's compassion and Richard Branson's sharp business powress", says Nishant Sarawgi, Strategic Partnerships and Marketing Manager, National Social Entrepreneurship Forum (NSEF) a youth-focused non-profit organisation. Social entrepreneurs are agents of change but with an entrepreneural approach. "He is an individual with innovative solutions to society's most pressing social problems with a strong non-negotiable focus to solving it and chooses an entrepreneural approach to solve by using entrepreneural systems and processes", adds Nishant. "Social entrepreneurs are not content just to give a fish or teach how to fish. They will not rest until they have revolutionised the fishing industry." goes a quote by Bill Drayton, CEO, chair and founder of Ashoka. "Social entreprenuership is the sector that is going to be a challenging field for innovators and leaders. It has just opened up and has already started showing signs of success by generating around dollar three trillion turnover globally", says Nishant. "People, government, corporations and funding agencies worldwide have realised that this is a way to achieve sustainable development and have started encouraging social entrpreneurs and innovators in several ways", he said. "In India social entrepreneurship has been gaining ground, more recently in the last three years with more and more youth evincing interest in the field, including those from prestigious IIMs and IITs", says 24-year-old Nishant, adding NSEF which runs a summer internship course has roughly 40 per cent of its students coming from such premier management and engineering institutions and an equal number evincing interest in the one year fellowship programme. .