Donors wanting to route
money through Asha to benefit from the tax-deduct status. Women’s Association
of Developmental Association. Started in 1993 by a group of mostly upper middle
class groups. Started with seminars and information sessions. Started with 2-3
members and have now grown to 40 regular members. In 1996 started work with one
of the clusters (JJ clusters) in the Delhi area. These are slums of migrant
workers and some of the poorest people in Delhi. About one-third being refugees
from Bangladesh. Ignored for a while but recently being recognized buy the
Delhi Slum Division Board. The implications are that they cannot be relocated
without adequate relocation plans. Over the last 3-5 years, WADA involved with
these people on a day-to-day way. Educational aspect is that they have primary
schools (2) for the children of this area. About 75 children in each school. In
addition to this they have: vocational training for women, legal awareness
classes for the women, distribute blankets in the winter (most expensive part
of their budget and need to give them out every year; a big part of their
budget, approx. Rs. 50,000). Also some amount paid to medical camps and medical
information. Apart from all of these activities, they also have micro-credit
units to the group of people. Usually in the range of 1000-5000 Rs. towards
small events in their lives. The return on this has been particularly poor and
they don’t expect a return on this. Education is about 16,000/month ($300;
salaries and honorarium for doctors. These schools will be taken over by the
Delhi Public schools in about a couple of years. The amount being routed is
$2000.00.
Issues Discussed:
Ø
Do we want to do this
at all? Not only just this project but also others.
Ø
We should have a site
visit planned over the next couple of years.
Ø
How many have we done
in the past? – Have done this before, e.g. SEED (about $6000.00 a year). SEED
particularly different, as it’s a KNOWN person and project. Couple of years
back we had a project where there was a proposal to route money. In that
instance, there was a thorough review process before it was released. These
usually were for projects that were known by Asha-Boston. So far it has been
small amounts. A number of other projects were discussed.
Ø
This was a wonderful
segue into the next topic….
WADA: 2 abstains, 3 no site
visit and 6 yes site visit.
TASK: [Dilip] Get a site visit for WADA arranged.
Project Specific
Donations Guidelines.
All for NEW
project-specific donations:
1.
Donor doesn’t need to have a history with Asha-Boston.
2. Any new project, we need to get a starting fund of $1000.00 irrespective of the number of people donating to making up this amount.
3.
Normal priority to the project – first come first serve basis
4.
One Asha volunteer should be involved
5.
Give decision within 3 months
6.
If project not approved, the entire amount will go to the Asha general funds
7.
Suggestion: that we would like the donors to get involved with Asha
8. Continuity and Sust.: If sustainability component, the donors STRONGLY recommended to fund multiple years
9. If this project is really good, Asha will continue supporting this project, so the review will be as rigorous as a normal Asha project (hence covers all regular specifications as a regular Asha project) – this is an internal guideline for Asha. For Donors, the projects that will have multiple years of funding will be more likely to be considered.
10. Asha as an independent entity will do
a site visit; before the money is given. Someone who is objective to all cases
will do this.
11.
No limit on the number of project-specific donations received.
OLD PROJECTS being
conducted as a project specific donation:
These will be treated as
Asha-stars ventures.