My name is Pranjal Oswal. I am an aspiring Psychologist, a Zumba Trainer and a Social Worker who gave birth to Philants Community Service. Since my childhood, I've seen so many of my relatives being successful in life and doing something so huge that has brought back a lot of wealth to them, but I couldn't, unfortunately, get inspired by them, but then there was one man, one hero called as ""Dad"" who truly inspired me, and I'm what I am because of him. My father has always believed in serving the one's who are underprivileged and disabled. I've seen him just do charity in my entire life till now under his own NGO along with handling and growing his business. Seeing him I always wondered what can I do for society and in what means can I work in a little different sector than him so that we reach out to a lot of people, that's when I decided that I want to start up serving people who live on the streets whom I refer to as ""Street Residents"" and then I used to go out during Diwali to give them sweets and clothes, but as and when I started getting connected to them, I understood that this much help isn't sufficient and decided to start my NGO with few volunteers to reach out all the street residents and try and feed them food every weekend. It's been 5 years since I am into social service and have started my NGO called @_philants_ with 300+ volunteers, and we've done massive food distribution, collaborations and fundraisers till now, and today we are working in & sectors of Social Service, and we'll continue to do so for all the rest of our lives as for us service is before self, and we are passionate to promote Social Service.
VOLUNTEERING FOR ME
Volunteering is the basic thing I believe that I am doing to give back to society, to showcase how grateful I am to have everything that I have today, and to promote the spirit of Social workers. I believe volunteering has got a tremendous power which can get so many people to witness your work and inspire them to join the notion along with you. If one person also joins me to create a change, my work as a volunteer is done.
VOLUNTEERING JOURNEY
I am volunteering since 2017, which is 5 years now and my inspiration is my Dad. My father inculcated the seed of being grateful for everything that I have and always be a giver. I saw him work in the social service sector for the disabled and blind children, but I never saw him or anybody when I was 18, work for the people living on the streets. I used to feel helpless seeing them starve to death. I wanted to change the scenario around. I wanted to feed them, give them clothes and help them even if it was going to change their condition by 1%.
VOLUNTEERING STORY
I used to see my father being engaged with social service activities. He always used to remove time from his busy schedule to help the unprivileged ones, and he barely did something for himself to date and has always chosen to help. I got inspired by his act and saw that he is working for the disabled and blind kids, and I should start working in an area where he is not working. I always used to see poor people on the street, whom I refer to as "Street Residents". I didn't see anybody work for them. I wanted to find a way to start working in this sector. I used to distribute food and clothes to a few street residents as and when it was possible, and I always believed in forming a rapport with the people I'm working for. I then started by feeding a small family, and unfortunately one day one member passed away because the food wasn't arranged for a long period, that's how I knew that alone I can't do much but together with an army, I can reach out to more needy people and create a change and the idea to than to start an NGO was planted with pure motives, of creating a change, being a source of hope and happiness and promoting social service so that more and more people join the cause. Today I have more than 350 volunteers relentlessly working in 7 sectors of social service with my organisation, and we are successfully working in two cities of Maharashtra, Pune being the headquarters. I still have to learn a lot and change a lot of things around me in terms of fulfilling my dreams, but I know that my dreams are unstoppable now, because I have a team that will make my dream come true. I have inspired more than 1 person to connect with the cause, and that's my biggest achievement.
PROJECT
I have worked and initiated 7 Sectors/ Projects of Social Service.
Street Residents Welfare Program.
Leaders of Tomorrow - Working for the Orphans.
Itni Si Hasi - Working for the Blind, Dumb and Deaf community.
Vriddhaveksha - working for the senior citizens in the old age homes.
Grow Green - Working for the environment.
Treasured Chest - Working for the Breast Cancer community.
Blood Bank - Connecting donee with the donors
ORGANISATION Philants Community Service
MISSION & VISION
The mission of the projects is to reach out to as many needy people as we can. We wish to promote social service and connect and inspire as many youths as possible so that they know the hardships of the unprivileged people and provide sustainable solutions to their problems. As youths, we are the future, and together we can create a change. Our Vision for the coming next 2 years is to increase the volunteer capacity to the strength of 1000+ and reaching out to more cities. We want the donors to know that they can trust us and fund us for our projects and their money will go in the right hands. We are working in 7 sectors and we wish to grow every sector and be efficient in every sector. We want to create an impact in such a way that if anybody needs help, they know Philants organisation will provide immediate aid, and the donors will be the ones promoting our work. We are currently working with one of the schools in Pune, where we have introduced social service as a subject, and we are pushing the students to work along with us in the multiple sectors that we have. In this way, we are already creating a revolution, and we wish to bring this subject in a lot of schools and colleges so that every child knows how privileged he/she is to have everything they have today.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Treasured Chests - Working for the Breast Cancer Community.
"TREASURED CHESTS" is a program that works for all the brave pink ladies out there, who have survived or are currently battling Breast Cancer.
It is our honour to work for such brave Pink Panthers. Our motive is to spread awareness about Breast Cancer, share inspiring stories, fund treatment charges for the lower strata and help all the ladies combat their journeys of Breast Cancer.
Leaders of Tomorrow- Working for the betterment of Orphaned kids.
"LEADERS OF TOMORROW", a community service program with a mission to serve the orphans, abandoned, underprivileged children across India.
Our vision for "Leaders of Tomorrow" is to make every orphan feel at home by helping them feel loved, nurtured, educate them individually & professionally, celebrate both our special occasions & grow together as a family. We strive to fulfil their emotional needs along with their materialistic requirements. We are helping them by organizing health camps, providing qualitative education, planning fun activities with the children and our team, organising workshops for them and celebrating both our birthdays and festivals with them.
Blood Bank - Working towards blood donations and awareness.
Here's to starting an initiative to CONNECT, DIGITISE and STREAMLINE the workflow of blood banks and helping the blood banks be blood sufficient.
There's a glorious delight in extending a hand and saving someone's life. We aim to spread awareness and motivate as many people as we can to donate blood and save lives.
Grow Green- Working for the Environment Welfare
"Grow Green" aims to work towards the conservation of our environment. We want to ensure that the natural environment is used wisely so that it continues to be available for the benefit of our future generations. Our main objectives are tree plantations, cleanliness, use of the three Rs of waste management and creating awareness about the environmental issues among society.
Vriddhaveksha- Working towards the welfare of Senior Citizens
“VriddhAveksha” ( Vriddh - Senior, Aveksha - Care) which in the name itself symbolises caring for the senior citizens, is an initiative taken by Philants to help the elderly of our nation and to build a sense of moral responsibility among the youth about the importance of senior care.
Itni Si Hasi- Working for the Blind Community.
"itni si has'', a project aiming to work for the visually impaired, sightless and mutism. We aspire to provide the differently-abled with as much as we have and the world with as much weakness as possible. Introducing you to new perspectives, sign languages, Braille readings and above all, empathy. Our ambition is to provide the less fortunate with white cane sticks, Braille books, hearing aids, FM systems, etc. We can't help everyone but everyone can help someone.
Street Residents- Working for their complete welfare.
Street Residents- Working for their complete welfare.
We work for the Street Residents and look after providing them with weekly meals, organising monthly clothes donation drives, making blessing bags( ration kits along with body essentials ), sponsoring education to the needy, tutoring the street children and coming up with events to raise funds for their well being.
LENGTH OF SERVICE
Street resident welfare program started in 2017 and is active to date and there will be no end date. Rest all the other projects have been initiated on February 2021 and there will be no end date for the same.
ROLE IN PROJECT
My role in these projects was that I initiated these projects and all of these projects were a result of my creative brain and philanthropy heart. My current role is to create tasks, collaboration and promote these projects. I take on the planning part. The skills that are being used that helped in my personal growth and development are: My Communication skills have sharpened a lot, I'm much more confident now, I have started managing my finance well and save a lot, I see myself as a Change Maker and being grateful is something that I've channelled through Social Work, I've been empathetic towards every helpless person and wish to hear their stories and help them out in any means. Everyday we get a chance to create something better around us and I've been privileged enough to not just be a part of the change but create one too.
IMPACT OF PROJECT
There are various impacts in the community because of the 7 Projects that we have. The people living on the Streets; Street Residents are getting proper hygienic meal once a meal, through which they are not getting dependent on us, but building a rapport with us, which makes them understand the concepts of earning in a meaningful manner rather than begging in a easier way. The Orphans get all the stationery material for their education and many get sponsorship for their education which promotes education and pushes every child to pursue their dreams, with this we also promote Adoption, so that there is no Orphan in this world and everyone has a complete family. All that the senior citizens expect at this age is love, care and attention. We spend as much time as we can on the possible Sunday's at the old age homes, to make the senior citizens feel at home and gain all the life experiences from them. We take care of the rations required at few old age homes also. Through our Environmental project, we are not just taking care of the cleanliness drives but also planting trees and promoting every little thing regarding environmental conservation. Our projects regarding the blind, dumb, deaf and breast cancer community are still baby project and we are right now just trying our best to promote the awareness about these projects right now. Our plan for future is to collaborate with various NGO already working in these sectors and gain knowledge and experience by working up close with them.
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS
GOAL 1: No Poverty
GOAL 2: Zero Hunger
GOAL 4: Quality Education
GOAL 6: Clean Water and Sanitation
GOAL 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
GOAL 10: Reduced Inequality
GOAL 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
GOAL 14: Life Below Water
GOAL 15: Life on Land
GOAL 17: Partnerships to achieve the Goal
ACHIEVEMENTS
Selected amongst 9 women in Pune for the doing a great job in the sector of Social Service under the recognition of "Who I am makes a difference" in 2021.
Published article on a youth run a magazine called " Youth Mania" in 2020.
FUTURE PLANS
My future plan is to lead all my sectors very well and make them self sustained for a long time. We have 6 sectors that are baby projects currently, therefore I want to pool in experts who have worked in these 6 sectors so that my team and I can learn from their experience and develop our sectors to be most impactful as they can. I wish for my team to grow and grow and every house must have at least one social worker is my dream. I believe with writing down everything about my organisation and myself, I've already felt that I'm filling a form of a very big organisation, who can help me take my organisations ahead of and who can teach us a lot if nothing else. We wish to reach to as many families as we can through this recognition platform so that every family knows what Philants is and how they can connect to a needy through us and completely be assured that the money has gone in the correct direction. This will be possible through this medium. Any kind of mentoring is going to be beneficial and that's the support, I am looking for.
Are you an aspiring volunteer, put your ideas into action at
National Volunteers Hackathon 2021