Social entrepreneurs are entrepreneurs who are adventurous and drive deep into the pressing problems of society and try to find solutions to them optimistically, not by leaving the responsibilities and the job in the controls of the government or businesses, but by trying to change systems and convincing societies to take new initiatives.
India’s gig economy is flying to newer heights and modern techs, owing to the surge of innovative start-ups and young entrepreneurs who are changing the rules of how businesses functioned. These young people do not only dream to achieve something big in life, but they also nurture their passion to resolve the social inequities holding the country back.
India needs these entrepreneurs to come out with high functioning business models to address environmental and social issues.
Topmost Social Entrepreneurs in India
Jeroo Billimoria
Ria Sharma
Sunil Bharti Mittal
Hanumappa Sudarshan
Ajaita Shah
Shaheen Mistri
Sushmita Ghosh
Dinabandhu Sahoo
Conclusion
FAQs
Topmost Social Entrepreneurs in India
Being an entrepreneur in any country is challenging, and addressing a social cause through it is undoubtedly going to make the journey more difficult but a fruitful one. As social entrepreneurs in India, one is on a never-ending mission to generate business for a social cause. The job is to implement a low-cost business solution for socio-causes while dealing with the shortage of funds, resources and many more. The problems and difficulties in the way are endless but the idea to change lives for good is the driving force and agenda that helps social entrepreneurs in India to navigate social entrepreneurship.
Jeroo Billimoria
Jeroo Billimoria is one of the accomplished and renowned social entrepreneur and the founder of several international NGOs who supervises for the betterment of society. She even initiated the Childline Program that aims to provide help in form of healthcare and police assistance, especially to the abandoned children.
Jeroo, from her childhood, had a vision of giving back to the underprivileged in society. She also believed in the concept of self-empowerment and the employment of women in India. She was felicitated with the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship and a holder of Ashoka Fellow as well.
Ria Sharma
Ria Sharma, born in New Delhi, is a social activist who graduated from Leeds College of Art, UK. She is the founder of world's first rehabilitation center for acid attack survivors.
Ria also founded Make Love Not Scars NGO in 2014, which is a rehabilitation center for acid attack survivors which are mostly women in India. It is the crowd-funded organization where it teams up to reach volunteers and funders through a social media platform. Ria was awarded the British Council’s Social Impact Award in the year 2016.
Yash Gupta
Sunil Bharti Mittal
Sunil Bharti Mittal is known as the founder of Airtel, which is one of the largest social enterprises that put the power of telecommunications in the hands of the poor society in the country. His efforts were to bring down the costs of mobile telephone and it has assisted millions of Indian farmers to receive regular and instant updates on crop and weather.
In the year of 2000, Sunil Bharti Mittal established the Bharti Foundation as performing philanthropic work in the area of education besides empowering young members of low-income communities through entrepreneurship.
Hanumappa Sudarshan
Hanumappa Sudarshan is one of the most admired tribal rights’ activists. His dedication and pursuits towards assisting the poor section of the Indian society made him an honorable recipient of the prestigious Padma Shri and the Right Livelihood Awards.
Hanumappa also founded the Vivekananda Girijana Kalyana Kendra in the year 1980 for the integrated development of the tribal population in the state of Karnataka. He is the Secretary and Founder of the Karuna Trust that is focused on promoting development in rural areas in Karnataka and Arunachal Pradesh.
Ajaita Shah
Ajaita Shah is the CEO and Founder of Frontier Markets and also the President of Frontier Innovation. Frontier Markets has sold around more than 25,000 clean energy products in India, especially in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan.
Frontier Markets is a company of rural sales, marketing, and service distribution that provides access to quality consumer and affordable durables to low-income households.
ATHUL C K
Shaheen Mistri
Shaheen is the founder of the Akanksha Foundation that pays special attention to educating the unprivileged sections of society. For two decades, Akanksha Foundation that initially started with just one center and 15 children is now assisting over 3,500 children in 58 centers and six schools. Shaheen has the belief and vision to remove illiteracy from the basic level in India.
Himangi Khare
Sushmita Ghosh
In the year of 1992, Sushmita Ghosh founded Changemakers after previously enjoying a successful career as a journalist. Changemakers is an online platform for solving open source problems. It has the vision to emerge as a self-energizing community of changemakers.
Sushmita Ghosh has also served as President of Ashoka from 2000-2005 and is now a board member of many non-profit organizations across the globe.
Dinabandhu Sahoo
Dinabandhu Sahoo speculated the use of seaweed as a product outside India and knew that it could be used in India as well. Even though seaweed wasn’t traditionally eaten in India, it can be used in lots of different products and is a relatively sustainable product to farm especially compared to its alternatives like shrimp farming.
Conclusion
Social entrepreneurship is, at its most basic level, doing business for a social cause. It might also be referred to as altruistic entrepreneurship. They don't measure their success in terms of profit alone – success to social entrepreneurs means that they have improved the world, however they define that.
The top social entrepreneurs from India were driven by an individual and strong desire to bring changes in the lives of people and their necessities, instead of waiting for someone else to bring those reforms. The future of India is on the brighter side with new social entrepreneurs following their paths in their ways.
FAQs
What are social entrepreneurship and examples?
Social entrepreneurship is, at its most basic level, doing business for a social cause. It might also be referred to as altruistic entrepreneurship. They don't measure their success in terms of profit alone – success to social entrepreneurs means that they have improved the world, however they define that.
What are the types of social entrepreneurship?
These different types of social entrepreneurship show just how varied the concept can be.
- Community Project. A community project is a relatively small-scale effort to address an issue within a specific community.
- Non-profit Organization.
- Co-operative (Co-op)
- Social Enterprise.
- Social Purpose Business.
Who was the first social entrepreneur?
The terms social entrepreneur and social entrepreneurship were used first in the literature in 1953 by H. Bowen in his book Social Responsibilities of the Businessman. The terms came into widespread use in the 1980s and 1990s, promoted by Bill Drayton, Charles Leadbeater, and others.
What makes a social entrepreneur?
A social entrepreneur is a person who pursues novel applications that have the potential to solve community-based problems. These individuals are willing to take on the risk and effort to create positive changes in society through their initiatives.
Do social entrepreneurs make money?
The short answer is that it depends. In many cases, social entrepreneurs do make money. Social entrepreneurs adopt a business model that puts their mission at the center of their business and are held accountable to their customers and stakeholders based on their proposed impact.
How does a social entrepreneur identify social needs?
One way to identify social needs is to consider the Human Development Indicators and then determine the willingness to participate and the commitment that the stakeholders acquire.
