TedX-PICT - Lessons from a Youth Activist - Aakash Shah

The founder and chairperson of Action For Pune Development, Aakash Shah, has been invited as a key-note speaker at numerous significant events across the world including United Nations My World 2.0 workshop in New York, UN Habitat-Young Social Innovators Conclave at Mumbai, Global Meeting of "Global Alliance for NGO's advocating for road safety at Marrakesh, Morocco & 35th session of Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland.

On September 30th 2017, Aakash was invited as a speaker at PICT TEDx 2017, which was hosted in Pune , attended by an audience of over 500. Aakash was the youngest speaker at the event. He shared his journey since inception and proved to be a strong source of motivation for engaging youth in community service and social development. Aakash has always been an inspiration to youth across the world. Being a youth activist and having worked with several multi-lateral agencies, he has successfully mobilised youth worldwide and formulated strategies for a number of global campaigns such as UN Millennium My World 2015 and World We Want, SaveKidsLives, HeForShe, etc. He has personified the power of youth and his exemplary work has been truly motivating not just for youth of the nation, but youth across the world. Aakash started his journey at a very young age, and is working towards integration of youth for the development process to secure a better future for generations to come. He has included several instances in his speech which focus on the role of the youth, thereby supporting his view that "Youth is the nation's blood and the architect of tomorrow's world"

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Reported By - Bina Goklaney, Editorial Team Head, A.P.D.

Skill Development Activity at MKSSS's Rama Sadan

"Celebrations are complete and happiness is doubled when there's togetherness"

Our team has started a new custom, of celebrating birthdays, once every month, with those who are away from their family. Through this, we aim to make a positive impact on the lives of maximum number of youngsters, who are indeed capable of reaching heights, just with the help of some guidance and resources.

In the month of August, we hosted a short entertainment and interactive programme for the young girls of MKSSS's Rama Sadan. Rama Sadan is a home for around 1500 girls, who belong to different strata, castes, religions and income groups; who are either partially or fully dependent on MKSSS for their food and living. Since our organisation has always been a strong supporter of gender equality and women empowerment, we chose to work with this organisation on a long-term basis.

We started the session by introducing ourselves and sharing our interests, and the girls equally reciprocated. Each of the 56 girls in the session, had a unique interest and belonged to the age group of 10 to 17 years. Owing to their enthusiasm, we deciphered how passionate they are about their career goals as well as artistic abilities.

As a part of the entertainment session, we played housie and the girls were happy to receive inspirational Marathi books as prizes. This was followed by a short birthday celebration where each girl who has their birthday in August, was given a rose sapling as a symbol of growth.

We plan to continue this activity every month, on the last Saturday of each month, wherein we'll not only host a celebration but also a skill development session for the girls, based on their age group and field of interest.
Although this is an interactive activity, our premier focus is development and women empowerment.

Reported By

Bina Goklaney, Editorial Team Head, A.P.D.