Report

December 2024

Towards a Just, Equitable,

Humane and Sustainable Society
Azim Premji Foundation

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 Report - December 2024

Azim Premji Foundation

Report - December 2024

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Azim Premji Foundation

Contents

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 Report - December 2024

01. The Foundation 06

1a. Approach and Objective 08
1b. Foundation – Few Snapshots 11

02. Our Organisation 15

2a. Field Institutes 16
2b. Grants 20
2c. University 24

03. Our Work 26

3a. Education 26
3b. Health 29
3c. Livelihoods 31
3d. Other Areas 32

04. Future 34

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Azim Premji Foundation

The Foundation

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 Report - December 2024

Contributing towards a just, equitable, humane and sustainable society is the vision
that guides the Azim Premji Foundation.

The Foundation was established on 18 February 2000 by Azim Premji. Since then, he
has irrevocably donated a substantial portion of his wealth to create the philanthropic
endowment of the Foundation. We work in India.

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Azim Premji Foundation

1a Approach and Objective

Our vision guides us to work towards equity, One way of looking at our work is to map it to
justice, humaneness and sustainability, these two dimensions. For example, education
through a range of initiatives; trying to make is both a basic need today and shapes values;
a difference to the lives of the people of our food and shelter, homes for the homeless
country and contributing to developing a serve the most basic and important of needs
society that we have pledged to ourselves in while work with youth groups on social
our Constitution. consciousness and living in harmony shapes
values. Needs and values scaffold each other.
To fulfil these objectives, we work on two
When needs are addressed, it empowers
dimensions:
the marginalised and gives them a voice and
• For people to get the basic necessities of when values are acted upon, it leads to a more
life – dignity, safety, health, food, basic dignified life for all.
livelihood, shelter, education, etc. This is Our work is informed by some basic beliefs
the ‘needs’ dimension of our work. and shaped by our learnings from both, our
• For people not to be subjected to injustice, experiences and those of others. Some key
discrimination or exploitation; and for ones are:
people to live in peace and harmony and act • Individuals, communities and societies are
with humaneness and empathy. This is the shaped by social-human processes and
‘values’ dimension of our work. forces which are complex, continually
evolving and only partially understood.

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 Report - December 2024

• Societies are forever in flux. Nothing is • Simplicity and directness are important;
ever ‘settled’, nor is the work ever ‘done’. with the flux and change all around,
The arc of history has to be continually simple and direct approaches have the
worked upon to make it bend towards best chance of making a difference.
justice.
• Rigour and quality of work must lead to
• Real changes need intense, deep, effects that are useful and valuable to
continuing effort at the grassroots. Strong individuals, communities and society.
organisations on the ground make all the
• There are distinct limits to what we can
difference.
do and what our work can contribute
• High-quality public systems are critical in to. This must not limit the efforts to
key areas, such as education, health, food contribute maximally, without getting
and social security, and infrastructure. ensnared by unreal ideas, such as ‘with
our smarts and money, we can change
• Civil society institutions play a crucial
all systems and soon the world’. In
role in a democratic society. They are
other words, we need humility in ample
the fifth pillar of a democracy. Setting up
measure, because in the vastness of this
and running vibrant institutions is very
world and its long history and future, we
important.
have a lot to be humble about.
• Specific needs of the most vulnerable
• Purposefulness and values are the core.
are worth serving in themselves, for
Means matter as much, if not more, than
example, homelessness or women at risk
the ends.
of violence. Making a difference to the
needs of people, even to small groups, is More detailed descriptions follow, but
a huge difference for them, and is hence our work, in brief, ranges from deep on-
worthwhile. the-ground work; both our own and that
• Expertise, which must be as close to the of partners, to setting up and running
ground as possible, matters. Expertise is institutions with social objectives, including
of (at least) three types: technical, social- universities. We also support governments
human and operational. All work requires to formulate and implement policies and to
all three to different degrees. Passion improve public systems.
and commitment provide the energy for
expertise to contribute.

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Azim Premji Foundation

Reach, Outreach | Effects, Impact

With everything that we do, or we help to do, 65 lakh students. If we could define it to
we try to make some difference to the lives be schools where teachers are trained
of some people or bring about some change through our systems and by master trainers
that is useful for society. So, to understand trained by us, then, our reach will be 3 crore
whether we are making a difference or not, students. If we look at our overall work,
and how much and under what conditions, we through our Field Institutes, our partners
try and study things carefully. We assess and and our university, we can justifiably claim
measure the effects of our work as well as the an outreach of a few tens of crores of
milestones along the way. More than giving us people. But such claims seem an overreach
satisfaction, such an assessment is useful for to us, so we avoid them as much as
improving our work. On this matter, we have possible.
learnt a few things:
• We have known and with each passing year,
• We prefer to use the word ‘effect’ instead our experience reinforces that what matters
of ‘impact’. Partly because impact has a most in life for individuals and societies,
very hard, almost aggressive connotation, often cannot be measured. Dignity,
and partly because all work has many empathy, care, courage and resilience
kinds of effects, some intended and some cannot be measured with any degree of
unintended, while impact conjures imagery validity or fidelity. This does not mean that
of mechanical systems, with great control there are things that cannot be measured;
and intentionality, which is unreal for social- children learning basic language and math
human situations. can be measured and must be, while
remembering that it is almost impossible to
• We avoid using descriptors or measures measure how the same children are learning
such as ‘reach’ and ‘outreach’. In our to care for each other or to be inclusive
experience, these are all fraught with cutting across caste, gender, religion in their
definitional errors. For example, in our lives. So, we measure and yet never forget
school education work, we can define our that what matters most cannot often be
work as only to be in those schools where measured.
we work directly. Then, our reach will be

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1b Foundation – Few Snapshots

Over 2,400 members and 940 partner organisations working across India.

Our work on the Ground Our Presence

Directly and with partners:
District Institutes - 59 (With 263 Teacher Learning Centres)
States with institutional presence
States without institutional presence Offices - 8
 Azim Premji Schools - 9
Only with partners
Azim Premji University campuses - 2
Azim Premji University campus under Construction - 1




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 Azim Premji Foundation

Our Direct Work

Education

Upper Primary School

Teachers: 1.12 L Upper Primary School
Students: 24.98 L

Teachers directly Students

engaged: covered:

Primary School
Teachers: 1.73 L 2.85 L 63.85 L Primary School
Students: 38.87 L

No. of
Anganwadi workers
Children covered:
directly engaged

1L 22.66 L
All figures are for a rolling 12 month period.
Numbers indicate direct work with unique individual teachers.

Work started in 2022

Health

Population covered by
3.9L

Rural work

Urban work 63,600

Creche Livelihoods
Chhattisgarh
Number of operational
creches spread across Number of 40 villages | 2,300 households
Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand children
and Odisha: covered:
Jharkhand
489 6,700 47 villages | 3,800 households

All figures as of September 2024

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 Report - December 2024

University
4 PG Programmes | 13 UG Programmes,
5 Diploma/ Certificate programmes |
100 + professional
development programmes

208
742

1,114
Total no.
Bengaluru
of students
Teaching Other currently
240
Roles: Roles: enrolled: 217

Bengaluru:
213
262 Bengaluru:
183
242 Bengaluru:
2,064 2,521 Bhopal

Bhopal: Bhopal: Undergraduate

Bhopal:
49 59 457 Postgraduate
Diploma

All figures as of September 2024

Campus size:

Bengaluru
100
acres
Ranchi
150
Bhopal acres
50 (Under construction)

acres

Over 4,300 over 6,000 participants in

students graduated professional development
programmes
All figures as of September 2024

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Azim Premji Foundation

Grants

182 < `1 Cr
231
`1-5 Cr
52
< `5 Cr
Grants approved in FY 23-24:

465
Value of grants committed in FY 23-24: Partners active in FY 23-24:
`1,422 Cr 940

Value of grants disbursed in FY 23-24: Average duration of our grants:

`934 Cr 3.3 years

Summary of Total Spends

Direct work Grants Total spends

FY: 21-22* FY: 22-23* FY: 23-24

616 cr
574 cr 594 cr

` 766 cr `
1,415 cr ` ` 934 cr
`

` 1,340 cr ` 2,031 cr ` 1,528 cr

*includes spends to help tackle COVID-19

Our spends are supported by the returns on the endowment funds

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 Report - December 2024

Our Organisation

Our organisation has three parts: where the work happens – in the Field
Institutes, with Partners, and in the
• Operating units: Which is how and where University.
we do our work. Our three operating units | Based on our assessment of the
are: growth of our work in an area, and the
| Field Institutes: Our institutional centrality of technical expertise (not
presence on the ground through which only operational and social-human) for
we do a range of our own work, from that area, we have a range of structures
education to health, livelihoods and – education and health are verticals,
more; and also work with partners. livelihoods is in formation, and others,
such as disability and gender issues, art
| Grants: Where we provide financial and culture, are constituted as groups.
grants to our Partners (other NGOs) to
do their work. • Enabling functions: These are functions,
such as Communications, Finance,
| University: Our University across Information Technology, Infrastructure
multiple campuses is run with the Management and Development, Knowledge
purpose of contributing to the social Management, New Initiatives and People
sector. Function (Human Resources), which ‘enable’
• Expertise verticals or groups: The different and work with the entire organisation.
areas of our work – education, health, • Endowment Office: A professional
livelihoods, and more – require relevant investment team manages our Endowment.
expertise.
| Verticals or groups ensure the acquisition
and development of such expertise and
its integration in our work closest to

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Azim Premji Foundation

2a Field Institutes
Our Field Institutes are in 59 districts of seven The work done by our Field Institutes
states and one Union Territory. Over 1,700 of includes:
our team members work in these institutes,
living in over 320 towns within these districts, • Capacity development of cadres, such
in each of which we also run at least one as teachers, principals, panchayat
‘Teacher Learning Centre’. This grassroots functionaries, community and primary
organisation that we have built over the past health workers, block- and district-level
20 years enables us to do intense, deep and functionaries, and state-level administrative
continuing work. leaders.

Such ground-level institutional presence has • Engagement with youth for social action.
also made us a part of the local community. • Projects with farmers, communities and
This enables us to engage with issues and panchayats on livelihoods.
priorities in a relevant and precise manner.
These Field Institutes were built with our • Range of support to institutions, such as
work to help improve the quality and equity Cluster and Block Resource Centres in
of the public education system. As a part education, District Institutes of Education
of this work in education, we also run 9 and Training, Primary and Community
Demonstration Schools. Healthcare Centres, Boards of Secondary
Education and State Councils of Education
With this institutional network, we have been Research and Training.
able to expand our work to other areas, such
as Health (including the running of creches), • Development of curriculum and textbooks,
Livelihoods and Youth Engagement. The improvement in assessment and
spread of our teams in these seven states examinations, and formulation of policy and
enables our work across the entire state. Most its implementation.
of our work is in collaboration with state
In addition to the seven states where we have
governments, and to help improve public
Field Institutes, we currently work in 10 other
systems.
states, on similar matters, with our teams
regularly visiting and continually engaged.

Our Field Institutes are spread across

59 districts in seven states and
one Union Territory, directly engaging
2.85 lakh elementary teachers; 1 lakh
Anganwadi workers

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 Report - December 2024

New Initiatives
We have started a few new initiatives, that • Strengthening nutrition in mid-day meals:
will, over time, become significant. Three of We have collaborated with the Government
these are: of Karnataka to provide eggs (or its
substitute) to school children going to
• Creches: We have set up and are running government schools in the state, as a part
over 480 creches, most of these in of the mid-day meal. We have committed
small villages in Odisha, Jharkhand and INR 1,500 crores to this programme to
Chhattisgarh, and in some urban areas. The provide eggs 4 days a week to over 55
creches serve the local community for care lakh children for three years. We are in
of children in the age group of 6 months discussion with other states for similar
to 3 years, providing good nutrition, multi- programmes.
dimensional stimulation for development, • Scholarship for girls: We are providing
and a safe and happy environment. The INR 30,000 per annum scholarship to girls
first 1,000 days of a child's life have the who have studied in government schools
most crucial bearing on their overall life and have procured admission in a bona-fide
outcomes. The creches help significantly college programme. The scholarship will
with this, since they serve families with be provided to support the out-of-pocket
highly inadequate resources, who struggle expenses for every year of their programme.
for livelihoods. They also enable mothers This year has seen a pilot launch in Madhya
to participate in economic activity outside Pradesh, parts of Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh
homes while also helping ensure that elder and Jharkhand. We are expecting to offer
siblings are not kept away from school to the scholarship to 20,000 – 30,000 girls this
provide childcare. Once we stabilise our year. In the next two years, we will expand
operating models, we intend to scale up the this programme countrywide.
number of creches to a few thousand.

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Azim Premji Foundation

Glimpses
from the Ground

Addressing learning loss due to pandemic-induced school closures

The COVID-19 pandemic forced teachers in these locations and providing
widespread school closures, leading to need-based support to a significant
significant learning loss among students. number of teachers through various
Our Field Study, ‘Loss of Learning During modes. This extensive effort began in
the Pandemic’, revealed a trend that was January 2022 and continued till the close of
of grave concern: students were not only the academic session of 2023-24.
falling behind in the current academic
Our on-the-ground comprehensive
year but had also forgotten foundational
involvement in execution and
concepts from previous grades, particularly
dissemination of these programmes
in language and mathematics. These
helped with significant improvements
findings were corroborated by multiple
in the learning of children. Our studies
other studies, including more recent ones,
indicate substantial improvements in
underscoring the severity of the situation.
learning across grades, especially primary
To address this, we developed and grades – in terms of students achieving
supported state-level programmes competencies that they had lost in
aimed at recovering lost learning. These language and mathematics – for around
programmes were adopted by all the states 65 lakh children in the areas where we
we work with, and a similar basic design work on the ground, recovery was about 3
was disseminated by the Government times more as compared to places where
of India, allowing many other states we have no intervention. A much larger
to implement it as well. Our recovery number of children in multiple states
programme included the development where we do not have on-the-ground
of an appropriate syllabus, workbooks teams were helped by this learning
for students and training materials for recovery approach, training and curriculum,
teachers. While state governments from the support we could provide to
deployed these programmes, we played relevant institutions and cadres in the
a direct role in districts where we have a education system.
presence, methodically training almost all

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 Report - December 2024

Glimpses
from the Ground

Barmer District Institute (DI)

Our District Institute (DI) in Barmer,
Rajasthan was established in 2012 and
currently has 52 members operating
from it.
Located in Barmer town, it serves the
entire district of Barmer with our work in
education and other initiatives.
Primarily focused on our work in
education, the DI offers development
programmes for primary and upper
primary school teachers, head teachers
and Anganwadi workers.
• A district-level annual literature festival
These programmes are often facilitated in
and book fair in which, along with
partnership with the District Institute of
teachers, students, and functionaries of
Education and Training (DIET) and other
the education department, community
bodies of the education department of
members also participate
the Government of Rajasthan.
A wide range of activities are undertaken The DI also serves as a space for our
and run from the DI, the more prominent members to engage in periodic district-
ones being: level capacity-building engagements.

• Workshops and voluntary forums for The DI houses a library that has a
teachers on subject-specific content collection of over 3,500 books, magazines,
and pedagogical practices and teaching-learning materials that is
used extensively by the district’s teachers,
• Teacher seminars where teachers share students, and even community members.
their good practices with each other
An integral part of the DI is the
Azim Premji School. The school currently
has 16 teachers and 300 students in
classes 1-8.
Overall, in the district, we engage with
over 11,300 teachers in primary and
7,400 teachers in upper primary schools.
Through these teachers, we cover 2.7 lakh
elementary-grade students.
Our interventions so far have led to better
teaching practices and improved learning
outcomes for students in the district.

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Azim Premji Foundation

2b Grants
We support grassroots civil society organisations across India with financial grants.
We support organisations of various sizes – from small and very early stage ones to those that
are large and mature. Thus, our grant sizes vary from a few lakh rupees to a few tens of crores;
as do tenures from 1-10 years, with most being between 3-4 years.
The work of our partner organisations is across a wide range of areas, some of which we have
grouped together and call ‘themes’. We are open to and continually adding new areas of work
that make a real difference in the lives of vulnerable and disadvantaged people.
We are setting up teams closer to our partners, which enables us to focus on certain
geographies in addition to the states where we already have institutional presence. This
includes Eastern Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Northeast India, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
We have also worked with multiple partners and state governments to develop a few specific
programmes. Some of these are for:

• Improvement in child nutrition in a few districts in Odisha

• Yield and cost improvements for small and marginal farmers in Andhra Pradesh
• Justice for undertrials in Maharashtra
• Effectiveness of panchayat functioning in Jharkhand
• Access to welfare entitlements and basic services in settlements in Bengaluru

Some of our ‘Themes’:

Gender Gender-based violence, issues around adolescent girls,

Justice gender and sexual minorities

Disability & Vulnerabilities of persons with physical or intellectual

Mental Health disabilities, mental health issues

Issues affecting vulnerable people in urban spaces,

Urban
Urban including homelessness, identity/age-based
Initiatives
Initiatives discrimination, violations of labour rights, lack of access
to welfare entitlements

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 Report - December 2024

Working on vulnerable children’s needs and rights for

Children
Children survival, development, protection and participation

Improving last-mile access to welfare services, access to

Governance
Governance
justice for the vulnerable, strengthening local democracy

Supporting the public system at all levels – community

Health &
Health &
health, primary healthcare, secondary hospitals – by
Nutrition
Nutrition improving their capacity and functioning

Issues of small and marginal farmers, landless, water

Land,
Land,Water,
Water, deficient communities, Adivasi communities, pastoralists'
Forest
Forest land, and ‘denotified’ groups

Building institutional capacity and programmatic

Strengthening
Strengthening understanding and delivery of CBOs and early-stage
Civil Society
Civil Society CSOs, and strengthening CSOs in the area of leadership,
governance, basic systems and processes

Constitutional
Constitutional Fellowships and youth programmes to promote values
Values
Values enshrined in the Constitution

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Azim Premji Foundation

Glimpses
from the Ground

Gender and governance in

Uttar Pradesh
Gramin Vikas Sansthan (GVS) is one of our
partners. Established in 1989 by Shameem
Abbasi and a few committed citizens, GVS
works on gender and governance, integrated Gramin Vikas Sansthan has
child development, sustainable livelihoods,
promotion of constitutional values and helped over 1 lakh women
democratic rights, and social cohesion in and 45,000 girls across
seven districts of eastern Uttar Pradesh. Its
work has helped more than 1 lakh women 800 gram panchayats.
and 45,000 girls across 800 gram panchayats.
Over the last eight years, the Foundation has
supported GVS in its work with adolescent
girls on their education, health, safety
and career development, and with fellows
for creating changes in social practices.
Our support has helped GVS establish a
skill development centre for girls from
marginalised groups. The organisation is
also enabling access to welfare schemes by
women in the community.

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 Report - December 2024

Glimpses
from the Ground

Community work in Nagaland

Eleutheros Christian Society (ECS)
is another of our partners. ECS was
established in 1993 by Dr Chingmak
Chang, and works on healthcare,
education, livelihoods and building of
community institutions in five districts
of eastern Nagaland. The work of ECS
has covered over 1.1 lakh people through
various interventions across 100 villages.
Over the last three years, the Foundation
has supported ECS in its work with
small and marginal farmers on livelihood
enhancement, and with the community
on healthcare and strengthening of
community institutions.

Eleytheros Christian Society has reached

over 1.1 lakh people through various
interventions across 100 villages in
Nagaland. With our support, they have
expanded the Maternity Unit at the
Primary Health Centre and set up a
residential skill centre and a farm school.

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Azim Premji Foundation

2c University
Our university campuses are in Bengaluru and humanities, such as economics,
and Bhopal; we are in the process of biology, math, physics, history, English and
setting up our third campus in Ranchi. philosophy. Our students are from across
the country and reflect the socioeconomic
The teaching and research programmes
diversity of our country. Over 50 percent
of the University are designed to
of our students are provided with
contribute towards equity, justice,
scholarships that include 100 percent
humaneness, and sustainability — the
tuition and accommodation fee waivers.
vision of the Foundation. We offer a
Our continuing education programmes
range of undergraduate and postgraduate
have a diverse set of participants – from
programmes, as well as continuing
teachers and senior government officials
education programmes for working
to members of civil society.
professionals. We also have a range of
publications and resources. The University, the Field Institutes
and some of our partners work in an
Our programmes are in areas of social and
integrated manner to provide students
human development, such as education,
with the richest possible curriculum,
teacher education, early childhood
including deep field immersion. This
education, development, public health,
integrated working also enables the
livelihoods and employment creation,
development of knowledge through
sustainability and climate change,
grounded research and contributions to
technology for social change, and social
policy and its implementation.
sector leadership; as also in disciplines
across the physical and social sciences

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 Report - December 2024

Glimpses
from the Ground

Winds of change in Chhattisgarh: Bastar

se Bazaar Tak
Bastar se Bazaar Tak is our alumnus Satendra Singh
Lilhare's (MA in Development, Batch 2014−16) initiative
to enhance the livelihood of Bastar region’s forest
dwellers. The participatory model provides additional
income with 100 days of employment opportunities
to the community in Chhattisgarh's densely forested
area. Lilhare's effort is to enable the people of these
communities in Bastar to leverage their expertise and
participate in market opportunities outside this region.
Lilhare and his team built a model to generate value
and employment through commercial trading of
seasonal forest produce. Lilhare plans to expand the
project and make it more sustainable by planting trees.
The initiative began with 1,175 farmers from 17
villages of Bastar. It has since expanded to include 120
farmers from 4 villages in Gadchiroli, Maharashtra,
and 120 farmers from 4 villages in Gumla, Jharkhand.
Lilhare plans to work in the Sukma region of South
Chhattisgarh by 2025.
The team also seeks to train and guide members in
business-related aspects of the model and is planning
to set up a factory.

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Azim Premji Foundation

Our Work

3a Education
The goal of our work in education is to help • School education is perhaps the most
improve the quality of and equity in the important organised social process for
public schooling system. We started this developing the individual and society.
work in 2002, and have learnt and refined our
• Education must develop knowledge,
approach in these past two decades, having
capacities, and values – in individuals, which
tried many things, many of which failed, some
then form the society.
worked partially and a few were effective.
• Education is a deeply social-human process
Our work in school education rests on and is
and therefore the human beings involved
informed by our understanding of education
in it matter the most – students, teachers,
which we have developed over the years.
school leaders and others.
Some of the more important aspects of which
are: • Teachers are central to good education;
school leaders also matter significantly,
therefore, human capacity is at the heart of
improving education.

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 Report - December 2024

• The culture of the school is an integral part examination reform and human capacity.
of the curriculum. Our attempt has been to contribute to the
development of human capacity at every
• Improvement in equity leads to
level of the education system – from the
improvement in quality.
Anganwadi and the school, to state- and
• The home and community environment of national-level institutions – because human
the students, including access to resources, capacity is the key, particularly in the
nutrition, and care, have direct and frontline.
significant effects on learning; schools can
Our institutional presence on the ground
and should attempt to compensate for this
through our Field Institutes is what enables
as much as possible.
our work on the capacity development
• The education system is a part of the of teachers and others. Like all our work
overall political-economic-societal system in education, this is also carried out in
of the country, therefore, many aspects of collaboration with the state governments.
the education system cannot be changed in
Capacity development of teachers takes place
isolation.
through multiple modes of engagement,
• Good policies matter, however, for example, short and long workshops,
implementation matters even more; the peer learning groups, on-site demonstration
real issue is on-the-ground capacity. workshops, in-school support and more.
Our methods and curriculum for teacher
• Education is a matter of deep expertise. It
development are continually refined based
is about developing the hearts and minds
on our experience and learning. The nine
of human beings – the most complex
schools that we run provide us with first-hand
of human processes. Too often there
experiences, which are then used by us to help
is a staggering underestimation of the
improve our overall work. We also research
requirement of expertise in education.
and explore issues that are important to the
real world of teachers and students, which we
Informed by these ideas our work has multiple also publish for dissemination.
dimensions.
Continuous engagement with teachers is
We have attempted to contribute to all essential to developing their capacities and
aspects of education, ranging from curriculum changing their perspectives, which is what
development and policy formulation to requires proximate on-the-ground presence.

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Azim Premji Foundation

In any given 4-week period we likely engage prepare teachers with Master's in Education
with more than one lakh teachers. We have and Early Childhood Care and Education;
a similar approach for our engagement of Diplomas in Inclusive Education, Learning
capacity development of school leaders and Disabilities, Early Childhood Education, and
other functionaries. Assessment; and Bachelor's in Science and
Education.
We work with the state government and its
institutions, such as the District Institute Over the years, we have seen significant
of Education and Training, State Council of improvements in the learning of students and
Education Research and Training and Boards the capacity of teachers – not only on the
of Examinations, to enable similar capacity content of subjects but also on matters of
development in places where we do not have inclusion, equity, justice, and development of
on-the-ground presence. values.
We also systematically support various state Our experience continues to energise us
governments, the central government and because there are large numbers of people
their institutions on matters of curriculum, amongst teachers and others who have a deep
textbooks, examinations, teacher education commitment to improving education and the
and policy formulation. While our Field future of our children.
Institutes are in 7 states, we work with the
school systems of 17 other states across the
country.
Our deep engagement on the ground informs
research that enables both policy and
improvements in ground-level work. At the
University, we offer a range of programmes to
build the capacity of the education sector and

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 Report - December 2024

3b Health
We work to improve the health of vulnerable
households – from remote Adivasi
communities to urban informal settlements.
Health is a public good, and our work is
guided by a few principles:

• Our aim is to help families live healthy lives;

it is not about access to healthcare services
alone.
• It requires a strong frontline community
health system, backed by primary and
secondary healthcare services.
• Only an effective public health system can
achieve this by reaching every corner of the
country, and in a manner that is affordable
and sustainable over decades.

Currently, our work in Health is focused on

five aspects:
Urban Health work in Bengaluru
• Urban Health work in Bengaluru
Our comprehensive primary programme
• Work in the Central Adivasi belt covers 15,000 households in informal
• Health Grants settlements.

• Research This includes:

• Public Health Education • Community health work

• Primary health centres with general
physicians, laboratories and pharmacies
• Referral helpdesks in government hospitals

Work in the Central Adivasi belt

We are currently working in two blocks
(Dharamjaigarh and Lailunga) of the Raigarh
district of Chhattisgarh and two blocks (Bero
and Itki) of the Ranchi district of Jharkhand.
Our team of health professionals on
the ground in these areas supports the
government to improve the frontline health
system.

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Azim Premji Foundation

Health Grants
We give multi-year grants to non-profit
organisations that work to improve the health
of vulnerable communities in their respective
geographies.

Research
We undertake and fund independent research
studies in public health. These studies
seek to improve the understanding of the
health realities of underserved communities.
Apart from direct studies being carried out as
an integral part of our fieldwork, we support
other organisations through research grants.

Public Health Education

We offer a full-time Master of Public
Health (MPH) programme, with a focus on
practice and competencies from Azim Premji
University’s Bhopal campus.
In addition to these initiatives, we are actively
working on two other key initiatives:

• Operating over 480 creches that cover

6,700 children in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand
and Odisha.
• Supplementing nutrition in the mid-day
meal of every government school student in
Karnataka.

We started our work in Health in 2022 and

are now rapidly expanding this work to other
parts of the country.

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 Report - December 2024

3c Livelihoods
We want to help make significant and external markets. This also involves improving
sustained improvements to the household incomes from existing livelihood options as
incomes of some of the most vulnerable well as creating new opportunities across
communities of the country. levels.
To do this, we work closely with these Beginning in 2022, we have taken our
communities to explore ways of enabling first steps in working towards sustainable
economic development that spans sectors livelihoods in the central tribal belt in the
and is based on and aligned to local resources, Raigarh and Gumla districts of Chhattisgarh
strengths, and culture, while accessing and Jharkhand, respectively.

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Azim Premji Foundation

3d Other Areas
The Foundation works in diverse areas Our work in Art and Culture takes the
through partners – some of these areas purpose of the Foundation to the people
that we call ‘themes’ are detailed in the of India through stories. These stories are
section on Grants. Our initiatives span delivered through various channels and
from offering shelter to the homeless forms: radio and podcasts, art, music and
in Bengaluru to enhancing access to film.
essential services by Adivasi communities
in Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand.
Much of our work is with and for
We also work to strengthen civil society public systems. So, we work in close
and its institutions in India, through collaboration with government
capacity building, enabling networks of functionaries – from teachers and
advocacy and supporting government ASHA workers to leaders at district,
initiatives. state and national levels. The
competence and dedication of a large
number of these functionaries across
levels, geographies, and institutions, are
exemplary. This greatly enhances the
effectiveness of all our work.

Enhancing access to essential services among Adivasi

communities is one of the areas that our Grants partners work in

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Report - December 2024

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Azim Premji Foundation

Future

The Foundation remains deeply

committed to working towards equity,
justice, humaneness and sustainability,
across the widest possible range of
initiatives, and to try and make a real
difference to the lives of people of
our country, and thus contribute to
developing a society that we have
envisioned in our Constitution.
We will try to expand and deepen
our work as much as possible and
support our partners in the same.
Fully accounting that in societal work,
changes, including expansion and
deepening, are effective when they
happen organically.

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 Report - December 2024

Our Values
Contribute to social change

Take ownership for significant

lasting effect

Act with unyielding integrity

and courage

Treat each person with respect

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 Azim Premji Foundation
134, Sarjapur Road, Next to Wipro Corporate Office,
Doddakannelli, Bengaluru, Karnataka - 560035

azimpremjifoundation.org azimpremjiuniversity.edu.in