25 success stories of social entrepreneurship

A reputed institution like BITS, Pilani can surely be expected to showcase its social entrepreneurship success stories which can in turn be an inspiration and a study of great interest for a wide variety of professionals in the society. Very aptly titled 'BITS of Social Impact' (Harper Collins, pp 252,2022, Rs 299/00) the book authored by Harsh Bhargava and Sai Prameela Konduru is a notable one with its five parts devoting itself to a wide variety of topics on the aforesaid theme. Both the authors were students of the institution, with the former, an ex-Commodore of Indian Navy and presently teaching social entrepreneurship while the latter, a software engineer by profession managing the BITSAA (BITS Alumni Association) as its CEO. The book has a foreword by Kumar Mangalam Birla, which informs the reader about the wide range of experiences collated, spread over sixty batches from 1960 to 2020. With such a wide-ranging sweep, the book covers the impact of social entrepreneurship across a wide range of fields including healthcare, education, environment, arts and culture and rural transformation. The Prime Minister, Narendra Modi too has picked out two of the social ventures and made a mention of it.

BITSians as the alumni is known have a unique bond with the country's independence as both of them came into being in 1947, having travelled 75 years during this period. Rather aptly, in its introduction the authors point out, among other things, the need to keep the venture sustainable. They mention about the three Ps – People, Profits and Planet which is also called the 'triple bottom line' for sustainability. The 25 inspiring stories in the book thus highlights the changemakers' individual approaches to each one of these steps. Embellished with visuals wherever required and also a few blurbs highlighting the core activities of these social entrepreneurship companies, it is a valuable collection of material for those who aspire to be entrepreneurs on similar lines. The language is very easy to comprehend and would surely give the reader a great feel of how India's professional lot are working to make a real difference in elevating the society and mitigating its disparities.