{"id":302185,"date":"2018-09-03T15:08:52","date_gmt":"2018-09-03T15:08:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/?p=302185"},"modified":"2018-09-03T15:08:52","modified_gmt":"2018-09-03T15:08:52","slug":"india-inc-rises-to-the-occasion-opens-up-its-purse-strings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/india-inc-rises-to-the-occasion-opens-up-its-purse-strings\/","title":{"rendered":"India INC Rises To The Occasion, Opens Up Its Purse Strings"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\"><strong><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-302196 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/tehelka.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"674\" height=\"380\" srcset=\"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-696x392.jpg 696w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-1068x601.jpg 1068w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-747x420.jpg 747w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3-1920x1080.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/tehelka.com\/media\/2018\/09\/Lead-3.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 674px) 100vw, 674px\" \/>The India<\/strong> Inc. too stood up and be counted in helping the flood-devastated Kerala and its people. All the top business leaders and captains of industry announced immediate relief in terms of money and materials.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">So far, the biggest donor was the Adani Foundation, with 25 crore for immediate relief, and another 25 crore committed for rehabilitation and resettlement. The parent group\u2019s employees have pledged a day\u2019s salary to Kerala. The foundation\u2019s members are working in remote areas of the state distributing relief materials.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">The Reliance Foundation contributed 21 crore, and also has placed relief teams on the ground. RF has committed to setting up medical camps with Malayalam-speaking doctors and paramedical staff, supplying medicines to the government for use by district authorities, and providing construction equipment and skilled workers to repair or rebuild public infrastructure. The parent group has contributed relief material close to 50 crore, mostly through Reliance Retail.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">It is not just the private sector even the public sector undertakings, individuals, government servants and private sector employees too pitched in with their contributions,\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Other significant corporate donors to the Chief Minister\u2019s Disaster Relief Fund are the Kerala State Electricity Board <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">(25cr), ICICI Bank (8cr), Ramco <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Cements (2cr), TVS Motors (1.5cr), Hero Motors, MRF, Muthoot Finance, Sun TV, and TV Sundram Iyengar &amp; Sons (1cr each). And VIT University, Vellore, sent <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">1 crore. The Mumbai-based Jyothi Laboratories, whose promoters hail from the state, donated 1.28 crore.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Also from West Asia, Dubai-based Fathi Health Care Group and Abir Group of Saudi Arabia donated 1 crore each. Axis Bank donated 2 crore and committed another 3 crore for rehabilitation through partner NGOs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Employees of GAIL contributed a day\u2019s salary, 1.54 crore. The PSU oil companies donated 25 crore, the <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Seafood Exporters Association sent <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">1.15 crore. CII-Telangana said member companies, including TCS, ITC PSPD, Gati, Shree Malani Group, Ankur Biscuits, Ravi Foods, and a few individual donors had sent over 23 tonnes of relief material, and two RO plants from Tata Projects, which can purify 1,000 litres an hour.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Kerala-based Josco Jewellers contributed 2.5 crore and Kalyan Jewellers <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">1.1 crore.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">The others who pitched in with their technology to help in relief and rescue operations include the technology majors like Google, retailer Amazon, Microsoft, Bigbasket and the like.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Google\u2019s Geo platform and Google Developers Experts issued warnings <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">of closed roads across the most affected districts. Google also activated its <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Person Finder in English and <\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Malayalam \u2014 about 22,000 records were checked at last count, a Google statement said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Retailer Amazon India is facilitating non-profits Habitat for Humanity India, World Vision India, and Goonj, and encouraging customers to donate relief goods to them through its platform. The company said employees have donated lakhs of rupees through.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Microsoft is also encouraging donations from its employees from their August salaries, and the company will match that sum, which would fund Oxfam India relief assistance. Similarly, German software-maker SAP has sent out a batch of supplies through HOPE Foundation to the most affected places.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">E-commerce major Flipkart and online grocery firms Grofers and Bigbasket are asking people to donate to NGO Goonj.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">A Eureka Forbes statement said it sent 16000 water bottles and also collaborated with Habitat India.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Reliance Digital said it would tie up with manufacturers for repair clinics <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">for appliances, with free labour and <\/span><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">materials at cost. Reliance Jio has given its Kerala customers free seven-day packages. Idea Cellular has set up call booths at relief camps in the most-affected areas to help people make free calls and waived SIM replacement charges till August 31.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">Several Malayali organisations in different cities across the globe collected money and material and sent them to Kerala for immediate relief.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The India Inc. too stood up and be counted in helping the flood-devastated Kerala and its people. All the top business leaders and captains of industry announced immediate relief in terms of money and materials. So far, the biggest donor was the Adani Foundation, with 25 crore for immediate relief, and another 25 crore committed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":302196,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[23,2205],"tags":[4692,4702,4694,4698,2789,466,4158,4695,4699,4700,4696,4693,4701,4691,4697],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302185"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302185"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302185\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":302208,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302185\/revisions\/302208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media\/302196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}